


The Price

by BitchyMuggle



Category: Naruto
Genre: Amnesia, Angst, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Angst with a Happy Ending, Apathy, Be Careful What You Wish For, Blood, Blood and Violence, Cannibalism (Implied), Captivity, Creepy, Curse Mark, Curses, Dark fic, Drama, F/M, Falling In Love, Fear Play, First Times, Friendship, Hallucinations, Horror, Hurt/Comfort, I write how I want, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Intimidation, Loss of Virginity, Love/Hate, Monsters, Mystery, Nightmares, No Rape Though, Oral Sex, Predator/Prey, Romance, Sasuke can be a good guy once you get past the angst, Sasuke is a moody awkward virgin in this bear with him, Sex, Sexual Tension, Shapeshifting, Slow Burn, Sorta captivity depending on how you look at it, Supernatural - Freeform, TRUST NO ONE, Threats, Trust Issues, Violence, Violent Sex, alternative universe (kinda cos I'm not spoiling the plot), horror imagery, just some lol, just very frustrated sex, no SLUT Sasuke cos that fucking annoys me sorry, pinning down, smut will be slow in coming don't rush me ;), the 'Uchihas' in this aren't to be trusted either so don't expect a happy family in this, there's monsters in this), well... you can trust SOME of them, will reference canon moments once in awhile
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-08-05
Updated: 2018-09-19
Packaged: 2018-12-11 08:35:43
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 13
Words: 42,531
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11710749
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BitchyMuggle/pseuds/BitchyMuggle
Summary: What is the price for a wish that goes against nature itself?A story in which a dream is realized within a nightmare.





	1. The Secret Village

**Author's Note:**

> Warning that I might edit this later on cos of spelling and grammar issues. I'm too high of caffeine.
> 
> Please don’t plagiarize or paraphrase cos I always find out (I have accounts in every fiction site but use this as my main writing account now).
> 
> Might update my other fanfics as well. All fanfics except one in particular will be updated so people following that fic, kindly don’t bring that story up in my other works.
> 
> This story will be dark but it’ll be a different sort of dark in comparison to my other stories.
> 
> I refuse to write Sasuke as a rapist or womanizer. Sasusaku is my main otp so duh, while I’m a dark author that likes using a lot of horror in sexual situations, this will not be the case in this fic.
> 
> There will be horror in this story, of course and plenty of drama and blood. There will also be a lot of Sasuke issues, lmao.
> 
> Just not that bullshit Slut Sasuke that annoys the crap out of me.
> 
> Note: The plot has a lot of twists and turns since I like keeping people guessing about my intentions. Sorry for any future headaches.
> 
> Please enjoy the fic. It’s been eternity since I’ve written for Naruto. I mostly wrote oneshots for tumblr and Wattpad but this will be longer so here we go!

The _creature_  had come out of nowhere. With it’s sickly grayish skin and a large clawed hand unlike anything Sakura had ever seen. She barely had enough time to dodge it when she had been separated from her group in the dark.

The attack of that thing had been too sudden. Despite it’s great size they hadn’t heard it or sensed any chakra from it. It was as if it had been _waiting_ for her team to camp out for the night after a long journey.

Just waiting patiently and probably watching them talk while setting up their sleeping spaces and preparing a simple quick meal.

Whatever that thing was, it possessed human intelligence. A _predatory_ intelligence. It intentionally attacked the center of their camp in a blinding speed with a guttural shout, forcing them to scatter in shock at it’s abrupt appearance.

The speed the creature moved in made it difficult to even describe it. It was grey, slightly bigger than a fully grown man and Sakura had managed to make out some ashy graying spiked hair before the ill prepared for battle separated her from her team.

She could no longer hear either Kakashi-sensei or Naruto yelling. The darkness she was in was too silent for her to even begin to guess where the campsite was. Time didn’t even make sense to her anymore because the darkness of night seemed to have dominated everything within sight.

As if the creature had planned on singling _her_ out for some sinister purpose that she dreaded theorizing on. She could feel it's bloodthirst even though she could no longer hear nor see it as she did the only thing she could do in that situation. 

Try to find her team. 

The more she moved over the trees trying to seek her team out, the more she came to the realization that the woods was seemingly getting darker with each movement forward. The increasing blackness of the forest was swallowing her whole. 

And it wasn't only getting darker, but more unnervingly silent. Like time was standing perfectly still despite her moving. The air around her soon started to feel almost poisonous as if to warn her off from something further ahead of her as the silence felt assaulting to her with the unease it brought. Perhaps it was her fear mixing with disorientation that gave every breath she took that sulfuric smell that burned her lungs.

 _This is dangerous.,_ There was a killing intent behind what she was unknowingly approaching. What she was living felt more like a bad dream or drugged vision than a reality. Her mind couldn’t even process the events that had occurred.

It had all happened too fast. 

She wanted to retrace her steps back to the camp but with that darkness that made her unable to even see the trees in front of her or the starry night sky as well as that scent that muddled her mind too much to think, there weren’t many options.

 _Stay still until it passes…,_ Hoping that confusing sensation she was getting would leave once she calmed herself, she finally paused.

That feeling of death ahead of her thankfully didn’t intensify once she stopped going forward.

She couldn’t even tell what she was standing on. Was it a tree branch or firm ground?

_I’m practically a sitting duck for that thing and Kakashi-sensei and Naruto could be hurt right now!_

Not hearing them in that dark void surrounding her wasn’t helping to keep her from panicking. If anything she was feeling her fear increase as her eyes looked into that impenetrable darkness that was unnatural. _Whatever_ was there really wanted her to stay away.

_Genjutsu…?_

Her eyes widened upon figuring out the cause of that darkness. How could she have not noticed it before? And it wasn’t a simple genjutsu but multiple ones layered one on top of the other. Whoever had done it had to have known that it was just too easy to release the genjutsu once discovered.

Taking a deep breath, she wanted to swear under her breath at not being able to see her own hands in the dark.

“Release!”

The first ripple of the genjutsu was satisfying as well the others as visibility began to increase.

_How many of them are there?! This must have been done by more than one person!_

She didn’t understand it. Something was being protected from her and her team. Could that have been why they were attacked by that strange creature that had swiped it’s giant claws at her as if to make her enter the woods and awaiting multilayered genjutsu?

 _Still, why would it make_ me _get close while the others are being held back…?_

With the fear inducing darkness cleared she could finally see something that made her blink in surprise and hold her breath.

Gates. There were gates no different than the ones for Konoha just ahead of her, yet there were no guards or even light to show any signs of life.

Just tall wooden gates without any symbols to tell her what hid behind the stones walls so out of place in the forest.

_A village…?_

An undiscovered village that had probably been there for a long time without anyone passing through once finding it and talking of its existence.

Unless anyone that had found the lone eerie place had been permanently silenced. She still had the memory of that creature at the campsite and the threatening smell literally warding her off from getting closer to those gates.

 _This_ was what was threatening her.

A hidden village guarded with stone, thick wooden gates that looked impressively heavy and a quiet forest with monsters running amok.

She mentally snorted at the word ‘amok’ because whatever that thing was smart and far from that word. It’s movements had been precise and it’s intention to make her team run in different directions in that forsaken forest became increasingly more obvious to her.

_Don’t go there._

Just as she was about step forward that warning entered her mind as if the thought wasn’t her own. She hadn’t even noticed that the sulfuric scent was gone.

_Turn around._

She couldn’t move even if she wanted to. Her feet were frozen on the branch she had been unknowingly standing on. Even her knees felt too stiff to bend to have her leap down.

_Leave!_

How could she leave if she couldn’t even move?! Her body was so still as her wide eyes simply stared at the closed gates that were foreboding to her. Despite their simplicity whatever they were protecting didn’t want her to open it and go inside.

But it didn’t want her to leave either.

 _Damn it move!,_ Unable to even look at her heavy feeling legs, Sakura gritted her teeth until she finally regained some sensation to her limbs that felt like they were being pricked with a thousand needles.

She was starting to breathe heavily just willing her legs to move so she could turn around and leave as soon as it was physically possible.

That was when she heard the sound of splintering wood behind her. Like something heavy landing purposely on a branch just feet behind her and cracking the wood.

The sound of it was too loud in the once quiet forest that she almost gave a startled cry because now she could feel it _watching_ her.

How long had it been watching her before making all that noise?

It _wanted_ her scared.

 _It’s got it’s wish._ , she thought angrily at the games it was playing with her.

“Who-who are you…?” her whisper sounded as pathetic as she felt being at the mercy of that unseen thing staring at her back.

Anger. Pure rage. It wasn’t even her own. It was practically an emotion that attacked her from what was standing behind her. There was an _intimacy_ in that rage. Almost a feeling of betrayal.

_Does it… Know me…?_

Puzzled about how familiar the energy was to her, she felt strain on her neck when she tried to turn her head to the side to get a better view of it.

It knew of her plans because as soon as she even thought of even getting a look at it, a scorching burn accompanied with the harsh sound of the back of her garments being torn stopped her.

Soon enough, she could feel a liquid warmth seeping out of her back and she smelled something metallic in the air.

Her blood slowly leaking out of the long gashes the creature had given her.

The thought of it being able to make her into mince meat while an invisible force kept her immobile made her nauseated with growing dread.

She was going to die just _standing_ there in front of it.

For a moment she wanted to call out a name. A name that she couldn’t connect to any face or even pronounce. Something _prevented_ her from calling out the name of that unknown person to protect her as something heavy, reeking of hate pushed on her wounded back until knocking her to the ground below.


	2. Old and New Wounds

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> SASUKEHHH! (Sakura woke up in a bad mood)

_Sakura had known from just one look. No, it was_ more _than just a look. He hadn't even been looking in her direction when she had seen it._

_It had been a flat blank stare with a hint of concealed determination that had told her clearly..._

_That he was leaving them._

_Sakura hadn't known what to do or to say to make him stay. She had been just a girl back then that hadn't understood yet she had been old enough to know he was in a silent pain that he zealously guarded and fueled until he had enough rage to leave her, the team and Konoha behind._

_"I know about your clan-!" she probably should have stopped herself there. The moment he stiffened his shoulders when she mentioned his dead kin without him turning around to look at her told her she was touching something he didn't like reliving._

_It made her wonder if anything she could say would make him waver or show a hint that he would change his mind. If anything she said reached him in that dark silent place he usually kept himself to put a distance between them._

_There had been no plan on her part when she had followed him. Just her desperation and childish hope because she was the only one that had known at the time what he was planning. Seen the small hints that he tried to cover with coldness or anger._

_"I'm so in love with you that I can't even stand it!"_

_What she was feeling at seeing him not responding to her words, not even glancing at her, was what made her just expose everything she had kept locked inside. She was practically baring herself to the boy she loved earnestly and painfully. No one had ever warned her that just saying those words while he remained silent would hurt so much._

_No one had told her she wouldn't be able to keep her tears from running down her cheeks and that her voice would crack with emotion making her lose control of herself on that quiet night as he stared at his exit to leave his old life behind for the revenge he couldn't stop thinking about. She knew he'd never stop seeking it. Even with her offering to give him happiness... Because he couldn't be ever at peace until he did what he thought was the right thing._

_But would doing what he wanted truly give him freedom of what gripped him? That was the unanswered question that made her want to stop him because she sensed that even getting his desire would give him nothing more than regret. Would even offering to assist him get him to consider not going down that path alone and full of pain?_

_He was too quiet as she wiped her tears sloppily. The warmth of the night suddenly felt too cold for her now after revealing everything to him who still had his back turned to her. Maybe because she expected him to mock her or just continue walking away. Or maybe she simply expected him to just say_ anything _._

_He could even compare her to Naruto. Say something like her having her heart on her sleeve or just plainly reject her confession._

_All she wanted was for him to say_ any _word. If he rejected her, she'd accept it as long as... He didn't leave. As long as he didn't continue to hurt himself seeking what he was going after alone. Now she was certain that it was only pain he'd been feeling. Pain she was sure he had been hiding for years before that night._

_Those had been her thoughts in those moments. Her telling him of her love might have seemed selfish and even reckless to him and for a moment she almost regretted how she sounded just blurting everything out without much thought when deeply down she just didn't want him to continue suffering._

_When he finally looked at her, she almost gasped because she couldn't see his face. Her heart skipped a beat in shock at not seeing it. It was as if some black void had erased his features. The small smirk when he had called her "annoying" with less cruelty than the first time, the way his eyes showed some emotion that was like a cross between some affection and self-depreciation._

_It was gone. Her eyes widened at the loss of it. What color were his eyes? What did his features look like? Even the sound of his voice was slowly being forgotten._

_The word "annoying" was more like a thought, an old memory, than his voice actually telling her._

_Everything had been too real to her before. Like she had lived the experience in the past, but now she couldn't even smell the night air or feel the warm breeze drying the tears on her cheeks as she stared at that faceless boy she remembered loving so much standing feet away from her._

Who are you...?

*****

The soft rustling of clothes was what awakened Sakura. Her eyes were sore and felt as if they had been sown shut that she was regretting snapping them open to the brightness she was currently in.

Though the brightness wasn't that intense. It was just that Sakura felt like shit that the dimmed sunlight brightening the unfamiliar room she was in felt like the sun was scorching her retinas.

_Where's Naruto...?_

Blinking slowly in disorientation after everything that had happened, she half expected to see Naruto just some distance away from her on his own bedding doing his bizarre morning routine of unconsciously scratching his crotch and sleepily swallowing his own spit until he was forced awake with a swift kick.

He had picked up that bad habit as a teenager and no matter how much she told him he did it, she'd catch him doing it again the next morning whenever they went on missions.

But... There was no Naruto and his sleepy grumblings.

She was in a rather small plain room, lying face down on a bed that she _knew_ wasn't hers.

Alarmed by the truth she gasped raggedly and tried to push herself off the bed only to cry out at feeling something burning her back. There was an aching hot pain going from the back of her neck, down to her tail bone. Just moving so abruptly made the cruel marks on her skin there feel cracked and wet.

Whatever was immobilizing her with pain had been reopened by her. She could literally smell the blood and pus leaving the cracked scabbed skin.

"Shit. Just my luck...," muttering that lowly thinking she was alone, she sagged on the bed that smelled freshly cleaned. Whoever had put her there had made certain she'd be comfortable on a neat bed with her back exposed so nothing could hinder it's natural healing.

She didn't know for how long she had been there. Her body was stiff from lack of movement so it couldn't have been mere hours of lying down doing nothing. Judging from how dry her mouth and throat was, and her body smell when she slightly wrinkled her nose at getting an accidental whiff of it, she could have been out for days.

"Ah! You're awake!" a woman's voice made Sakura's entire body stiffen on the bed. There she was wounded by some unknown thing, with her shirt and chest bindings off, laying on a stranger's bed and unable to get her body to even move enough to heal herself to get the fuck out of Dodge.

She didn't even know if the place she was in was enemy territory or just owned by a band of weirdos.

The woman that had spoken to her had been unseen to her because she had been somewhere on the far end of the room. That was where the rustling that had awakened her had originated from.

Holding her breath she waited, although she was internally starting to panic at recalling just how she got her back wounded.

 _That monster... That_ thing _tried to kill me and I fell off that tree branch in front of those gates!_

She started cursing herself for being weak enough to be in such a vulnerable position. Did she even have her shuriken or kunai close by? What about her soldier pills or medicines? If she could get her hands on those, she'd be out of there in less than two minutes.

_These claw marks are definitely infected..._

Gritting her teeth, she hated how she was truly starting to panic. Losing her head didn't help anybody. She could perfectly handle the situation if she remained calm and assessed the situation-

_To hell with that! I need to get out of here! Naruto and Kakashi-sensei-!_

"My sons found you outside bleeding-"

"Huh?" her inner ranting came to a quick halt as she looked up and saw that the woman was standing next to the bed now.

Sakura blinked, not knowing what she had been waiting to see once her savior had revealed herself. It almost made her feel stupid that her mind had been going in overdrive thinking that she was being kept captive by some evil faced madwoman.

But all she saw was an attractive older woman wearing an apron over her casual grey robes. There weren't even any signs of weapons that Sakura could see but that wouldn't stop her from being on her guard. She had seen kids killing fully grown adults before so a petite delicate looking woman like the one staring down at her could very well be lethal.

With long straight black hair, pale skin and big pitch black eyes, Sakura couldn't even tell how old the woman was.

"My sons...," the unnamed woman folded her hands and smiled at her patiently as if expecting her to start firing off such questions. "They went out because they heard a scream and they found you there on the ground-"

Sakura swallowed at hearing this, staring up at the woman unblinkingly as she continued.

"-they chased off something in the trees. There's some dangerous creatures in the woods here so they brought you in as quickly as possible-"

 _Wait... Am I_ inside _that place behind the gates?_

"My youngest son insisted on you using his room until you recover. We tried to do something about your wounds but whatever caused it had some strange chakra that deflects anything we've tried-," listening to the woman explain apologetically, Sakura tried not to sigh out loud at the sound of that. She could heal herself and the infection quickly enough but having the kind faced older woman telling her everything that had happened to her kept her from just rushing to do anything.

 _As if I can even move when infected like this with depleted chakra... What did that_ thing _do to me?_

"My youngest will be happy to see you're awake now. I'd never seen him so worried. He's been too quiet lately...," the woman's small grin almost had Sakura rolling her eyes.

The last thing she needed was to have someone play matchmaker between her and a little boy because she doubted the woman was old enough to have a son her age.

If she did have a son her age the woman either had to have started having kids at age twelve or might have discovered the fountain of youth.

_Be nice... They saved your ass!_

Her weakness and wounds were bringing out a bad side of her. Instead of just being angry she should try to recuperate her strength to get out of there and get to her team.

"Sorry...," the woman's eyes widened at her sudden mumbled apology.

"What are you apologizing for? This could happen to anyone. You're a kunoichi, aren't you?"

Sakura felt her chest tighten at what the woman just innocently asked. She shouldn't have been surprised. They must have found her with her weapons before taking them away to put her on the bed.

_Must be my imagination. This looks like a civilian._

Telling herself that she ignored the familiarity of the woman's pretty delicate features or just how eerily black like fathomless pools her eyes were.

_Those dark eyes._

"I... I just wanted to apologize for imposing and taking your son's bed...," she didn't even recognize her own voice. It was a low croaking sound that had her wincing slightly in embarrassment.

The woman laughed lightly at that, waving a dismissive hand. She had a lovely laugh.

"Oh that. My son Sasuke wouldn't have had it any other way."

_Sasuke?_

That name... It brought back the pain of the dreams she had been having since she could remember. Just hearing that name made her heart begin to race in painful awareness when she couldn't even remember knowing anyone named Sasuke. It almost physically  _hurt_ that she couldn't remember. 

"Well, I should let you rest as I get you something to eat. You've been asleep for two days," Sakura wanted to kick herself for that just as the woman seemed to turn around to leave her.

"Wait...!" the desperate edge in her cry had Sakura blushing when the woman glanced over her shoulder to look at her questioningly.

"Yes?"

"What... What is your name?"

"How could I forget?" the woman looked almost embarrassed herself. "I was too busy telling you about other things-"

Sakura patiently waited.

"My name is Mikoto, Uchiha Mikoto."

*****

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please leave a kudos and/or review if you liked.
> 
> I feel rusty af writing for Naruto.
> 
> And in case people are curious. I'm kinda writing Sasuke and Sakura as being 18 at least but I do intend to show them as fully grown adults like in present canon later on. You'll see why. Pretty sure the plot is confusing you, but there's hints in the tags. This is meant to make ya'll theorize about what's going on. ;)
> 
> Yes I'm aware that Mikoto was a kunoichi herself but remember that Sakura literally doesn't know squat of what's going on or who these people are.
> 
> My chapters might get longer as I get myself into the swing of things.


	3. Like A Disease

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Some curse of hatred Sasuke (he wasn't in his right mind)

_There was nearly no recognition from him. Only a blindness filled with the feeling of deep betrayal._

_He couldn’t understand why if his mind didn’t completely recognize her, why did he feel so deceived and wounded by her trying to kill him? It wasn’t annoyance at her attempt; it was that she tried to kill him herself and it made him feel an anger that bordered on insanity._

_In little time in those moments his logical side, the one not consumed by his unseeing madness, answered him. It was the intimacy of her actions… Her holding that kunai while her eyes were filled with tears, the very sobbing breath she tried to hold in when sneaking behind him felt too_ close _. He_ hated _that invasion into the inner world he’d created for himself and the fact that the act of her alone wanting to end him made his crazed mind think that he for a split second no longer belonged to himself._

_But to her. She who threatened him even if she was weaker than him and couldn’t think of a good way to attack him without him noticing._

_It wasn’t power and strength that made her a threat. It was just that it was_ her _. One of the people his hateful need saw as a threat to his goal and he forced himself to leave behind because she had almost convinced him that one time when he had been such a weak boy..._

_Her words, her tears back then... They had made him wish for something that he couldn't dream of having._

_A normal life. Friends, family. Had she known what he'd been thinking?_

_The hatred was too strong in the present that even recalling the brief moment of wanting to stay in Konoha, with his team made the vile emotion tighten its grip punishingly in his mind. It was a powerful thing that seemed to uncurl inside of him each day with it’s poison that clouded his mind and his memories. Every time he thought of ever going back, of even wanting things as they used to be, that filthy emotion would suffocate him and just the sensation of being unable to breathe angered him more._

_She was making it worse. More intense, because he'd remember that night she shook his resolve._

_Her voice annoyed him, her eyes, her face,_ everything _annoyed him because it hurt to have that hatred coming back up again to eat up anything good he felt away. The foulness, the detachment of it, liked to keep him in check and right now that possessive grip was being attacked by her._

 _Her being close, looking at him with that fierce stare that hid her disappointment in what he was doing,_ wounded _that thing controlling him._

_He had to get rid of her. She was messing up his plans by only existing._

_He needed to_ kill _her._

Love? She spoke of it, didn’t she…? _, his thoughts were a chaos of scattered memories and emotions with rage that clouded them all._

 _It was frustrating because while he had this loathsome thing controlling him, a part of him knew it wasn’t him. He could almost hear the old sentimental him in some dark corner shouting in pain as he allowed the twisted loathing he directed towards_ Them _, his former comrades, consume him._

_There was no affection left within him. He had to tell this to himself. It had all died years ago. He didn’t even think he could feel or show love again. Would he even want to harbor those emotions for anyone again?_

_Why would he want that when it could all be taken away so he could be left as he was now? Just a shell with vacant eyes that only showed signs of life when he was hurting those closest to him._

_Making the ones fighting to bring him back suffer because they were trying to crack that comforting shield he’d built around himself to achieve his goal._

_Hating was the safer option._

I'm letting go. Its the only way. 

_Though his eyes were flat when looking at her, he’d never been so alive. The power of letting it take control of him, of finally ceasing to care at all, was almost addictive._

_Feeling nothing at all was the closest thing he’d gotten to comfort in all these years._

_That pink haired girl in front of him was just another threat. Plain and simple. She wasn’t a comrade or a girl who had shouted her love for him years earlier in a futile attempt to get him to stay. She was_ no one _to him and that’s what made it too easy for him in his hateful wounded mind…_

_To grab her by the throat and snatch her kunai into his own hand._

*****

More noises. This time they were of wood sliding instead of clothes being folded like hours earlier.

These were now the sounds of someone discreetly opening drawers in the dark around a sleeping feverish girl that could barely move.

Alerted by the fact that she was no longer alone in a completely darkened room, Sakura’s eyes quickly opened to stare apprehensively into the area beside her borrowed bed.

Only a sliver of light shone into the room from a slightly ajar door. Whoever had gone inside didn’t look like he or she wanted her to be accidentally awakened and had thoughtfully tried to keep most of the light from the outside hallway from streaming into the small bedroom.

The low sound of another drawer being opened quietly from what she guessed was a small dresser right beside the bed she was on, reached her ears. Some rummaging through clothes could be heard and she started feeling like she was invading someone’s privacy by just watching their shadow doing something as normal as searching for clothes.

_This must be Sasuke…_

Blood rushed to her cheeks. The guy who’s bed she was hogging was in the room with her, moving in the dark, probably looking through his personal things quietly and she was just giving him a squinty eyed look of suspicion like _he_ was the one out of place.

Common sense told her she should fake sleeping again. She didn’t want him to figure out she was just looking at his shadow crouching down to look through his own drawers.

But when the sounds that had awakened her soon stopped it became too quiet. There was a feeling of _awareness_ like he was staring back at her in the dark.

The ensuing silence and _stillness_  made her suddenly self-conscious. She couldn’t even see his face because of the dark but the quiet heaviness of his stare alone had her quickly wanting to come up with something to say to end the uncomfortable staring match she was having with someone she couldn’t even see clearly.

“Er…,” that was it. She should pat herself on the back for her conversational skills. Though all she could really see was his silhouette, she could tell his body stiffened by how his shoulders straightened and his crouching form looked like he was about to stand up and bolt.

“I didn’t mean to wake you,” her chest ached at finally hearing his voice. It was definitely deeper than the young boy she had been expecting. There was no emotion in his words not that it should have surprised her. He was just saying something factual just for the sake of saying anything to crack the tension.

_This is getting awkward…_

“Don’t worry about that…,” she wanted to punch herself because she knew he was still staring at her lying there.

Then it finally dawned on her. All the redness on her face immediately blanched.

The _coolness_ on her back was what reminded her. 

_I’m half naked on this bed with a fully grown guy I don’t even know in the room with me!_

Sakura wasn’t some innocent little kid. Well in some ways she was still innocent but when it came to others, she wasn’t dumb. She’d practically grown up around boys, the only girls she’d ever been close to being Ino, Tsunade-sama and her own mom.

There’d been a lot of occasions that lead to embarrassment because she was in a team in which she was the only girl.

Accidentally seeing each other naked or just partially so, doing basic necessities and getting caught. She had some issues with Naruto forgetting she was a girl more than once and him relieving himself near a bush or a tree and then there was seeing him naked because he’d strip and jump into a lake in a blistering hot day.

Now she was vulnerable with her back bare and a quiet boy that she was certain could see her better than she could see him.

She was cursing it being dark because she could only _feel_ him staring at her. For all she knew he could have eyeballed her like a pervert. Even when him and his brother had brought her in, he could have gotten a good eyeful of her naked chest. The urge to scream her head off and move her pained body to cover up had her flinching visibly.

Healing scabs and slight fever be damned. She literally had her naked _breasts_ pressed on this guy’s mattress. Sakura wasn’t big in that department but still…

_Get him out of here!_

About to open her mouth to just yell at him like a banshee, the boy spoke again, his voice monotone and smooth. His calmness was soothing and annoying at the same time because she was about to snap.

“I didn’t see anything.”

She clenched her teeth. She couldn’t see squat and he’d figured her out. What was she? An open book for this strange boy?

“How many people were with you?”

That sudden question had her pressing her lips into a thin line. This could be an enemy so telling him that she had a teammate and a sensei in those dangerous woods probably wasn’t the wisest idea.

“I was alone…,” the lie took too long in being uttered. The silence that followed was near intimidating to her because it was as if he could _tell_ she was lying to him.

She heard a low sigh. It was so low she could have missed it.

“My father and brother are searching the woods just in case. It’s not safe there.”

Guilt had Sakura biting her lower lip. Maybe she was wrong about these people and they really wanted to help. Her throat tightened at the thought of just telling him so they’d find the rest of her team.

They could be wounded or worse.

Going against her instincts that screamed for safety she murmured a single word.

“Two.”

He didn’t respond when he stood up. Seeing his shadow standing to it's full height had her swallowing dryly.

_Yeah, definitely not a little boy. Just great. Now I’m more embarrassed._

He was at least the same height as Naruto, maybe even taller than him. Forcing herself to not think about it to not feel even more awkward she moved her thoughts to other matters despite her face feeling like it was literally on fire.

_That was it? Just getting some clothes and info?_

Sakura wasn’t disappointed, but a part of her had expected more from their brief exchange. Anything to put her at ease or that could tell her exactly what sort of people she was dealing with.

The boy she was sure was the Sasuke Mikoto had mentioned had controlled the conversation so that only she’d be at a disadvantage by giving him information. He wasn’t to be underestimated even though he’d helped bring her in and gave her his bed.

“I’m sorry about your bed-”

“It’s nothing,” she immediately closed her mouth at his reply. He really _did_ control the conversation. There was no way she could figure this guy out like this.

He was just direct and didn’t say more than what was necessary. There was no emotion in his voice at all which made it more difficult to get a good idea of what he was like.

Was he good or bad?

_I shouldn’t have said anything!_

“Get some rest. We might find them tonight,” those were his final words. They felt ominous to her for some reason. She couldn’t figure out why but something in the way he said it made it appear like finding Naruto and Kakashi-sensei could be a bad thing.

*****

Being alone these days was no longer as comforting for him as it was in the past.

There had been no introductions or heartfelt reunions. There was no good reason for it, not when she or anyone outside those gates didn’t know him, at least not as they used to.

Sasuke knew he should have been angry. Seeing _her_ again. Knowing that _they_ were close by. It wasn’t an anger because he loathed them. It was an anger because they were probably in more danger now than they could ever be.

Standing in the middle of the sitting room in the first floor, Sasuke didn’t move. His thoughts were too focused on the familiar girl wounded in his room and the rest of the team probably fighting for survival in those woods against something that wasn’t even human.

He wanted to get her out of there. Even the house she was in could be far worse than the woods him and Itachi found her in. She was practically in a wolves den and the house they were in was as quiet as the other houses with his ‘clan’.

_They’re all out._

That was why it was so silent and the outside of the windows were blackened as if someone had painted over the glass to prevent all light from entering.

The absolute lack of sound with the feeling of threat in the air had him unwilling to move although he knew that the best thing he could do at the moment was leave the house. It was already late at night and it’d get more physically harder for him to be near her when she was in that weakened state.

Pressing his folded clothes tightly to his side with his one remaining right arm, he could feel the rage coming back. That was what he hated most. Having it coming back again mockingly, making his skin burn with power he couldn’t control.

“Two more,” his low voice was the only sound in the house. He knew who Sakura had been with that night. It had been a surprise that she had tried to lie to him about it but that only reminded him that they both weren’t as they used to be.

Years did that to a person. The Sakura he had spoken to earlier wasn’t the girl he had known and he was…

No one she knew.

There was no discernable emotion that could explain how he felt about that. Seeing her again and knowing her without her recognizing him.

She had changed. There was no girlish fawning, but a woman who suspected him with good reasons to. She probably even feared him and he couldn’t blame her. Her fearing him would probably be for the best because letting her get too close with the new danger surrounding her could get her killed.

And she had been  _clawed_ by It.

He didn’t bother naming what he was feeling or thinking. Nothing could have prepared him to be found by one of Them. All he could do was notice small physical sensations like his jaw clenching and his stomach twisting with unease because of the intense hate that was taking over him again.

He needed to get out. To get away from her.

Blocking her out from his thoughts, he forced himself to move forward to leave the shadowy sitting room.

He had to go outside to that inky blackness again because it was the only safe place he could be everytime It happened.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please leave a kudos or review. (wtf is going on in there? The Uchiha clan is alive? What did I do? XD)


	4. Devour

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Blushy Sasuke. Sakura's boobs. The boy has a beastly side he's hiding.

The next morning, she was still asleep. Sasuke was getting annoyed at her complete lack of self-preservation. He knew she had been overcome with fever and depleting chakra. He _knew_ his irritation about that fact was unfair and that it shouldn't be directed at her, yet he was still angry about the danger she was in. 

Of all the people to have found that place, why did it have to be _her_? Why couldn't it have been some other random ninja that he didn't feel any sense of closeness to in the past? It was as if fate itself was toying with him by having one of his old teammates find him again when he was in a more dangerous state than in the past. 

It was near impossible to contain the rage of having one of _Them_ near, but regardless of this, he couldn't stay away from her as she recuperated on his bed, unaware of him sitting stiffly on a chair beside it just observing her. The hateful side that kept his whole body rigid and unmoving since he'd gotten back to just watch over her, was studying her with venomous suspicion. Just waiting for _it_ to feel the need to strike whatever threat she posed to its existence inside of him. 

Sasuke couldn't get away from her even if he wanted to. The violent urge to get rid of her kept him close to her as if he didn't want to miss anything she did that might set _It_ off even when he wasn't around. 

_I shouldn't have come to my room last night._

He wasn't going to make a move towards her. Not as long as he could help it. His feet were firmly on the ground as he sat on that hard wooden chair with his back so straight it could snap, just to restrain that feral thing inside of him from finishing what it had started on Sakura. 

The long claw marks on her back were ugly and had purpling edges to it from the infection her fever and sweat was fighting off in her heavy sleep. He could nearly smell the sickness in the long scabs and the metallic scent of dried blood even though his mother had cleaned her wounds the first night after she was brought in. 

Yet, despite her fever, her face was still of the girl he remembered leaving at the gates. Older but the same. Her cheeks were flushed and a light sheen of sweat covered her slightly grimacing features as her pink locks stuck to the side of her moistened neck and cheeks. She was perspiring so much her pale pink hair was darkened by it.

He could practically see a bead of sweat move slowly down her reddened cheek before it slowly descended down to her parted lips. Sakura didn't notice it. Probably hadn't even felt the drop's caressing descent on her skin. Her sleep was too deep to even realize she was being watched. 

_How do I get her out of here without anyone noticing? Can I get her out of here at all?_

He had been staring at her so long he was noticing even the smallest of details of her sleeping form. The small breaths that left her chapped lips, how the pink of her cheeks matched her dampened hair, and other things he was trying to avoid looking at to give her at least some sense of privacy during his watch over her. 

Just keeping his eyes to her wounds and flushed face was all he could do although a small part of him suggested he should use a cool cloth to wipe her sweat and give her some relief. 

His jaw clenched hard until his teeth ached despite his watchful eyes remaining devoid of expression. 

He couldn't even trust _himself_ to touch her when she needed tending to. What use was he in the room? Just sitting there, perfectly still, and afraid of making any form of contact wasn't of any use to get her better and to safety. 

His gaze moved from her pained face to the wounds on her bare back again. They weren't bleeding and seemed to be healing slowly, yet that didn't put him at ease at all. 

Those scabs had a foreign chakra to them. Something that even the best medic couldn't remedy once the wounds were completely healed over. 

 _Its not her fault._ , his one hand tightened into a fist on his lap. The one to blame was him for not thinking that maybe some day he'd be found once again by the unlikeliest of people. If he had known, that place would have had better security or better yet, had been moved to a more remote area where people wouldn't ever frequent. 

If she hadn't been in those woods that night _It_ wouldn't have found her to pursue her until she was lead to him. 

What had that violent creature been thinking when it went after her out of the other two in his old team? It felt like some conspiracy that he was never getting answers to because the angrier he got, the more that _thing_ stayed quiet and just lingered as a menacing presence that never once spoke or gave indications of its plotting. 

Sakura's low moan startled him in his deep thoughts though the only hint he showed of surprise was his eyes slightly widening and his once vacant stare at her wounds snap to her face turned towards him. 

" _Sasuke_...," it was just a small whisper that gave an almost pleasant chill to his too hot skin. The rage that kept him rooted to the spot was like fire scorching him but her voice gave him a soothing coolness. 

It was irritating to him. He didn't even know why the effect was infuriating for him. If he was soothed shouldn't he be _happier_ for it instead of wishing to find some bindings to cover her mouth so she wouldn't utter his name in that tone again?

She gasped softly and shifted in her sleep. He was thankful she remained on her stomach so her back wouldn't land on the sheets and make the healing process take even longer. 

_I should leave. She could be making all these noises because she's waking up._

Frowning, he relaxed his form on the chair, preparing to leave before she opened her eyes to see him sitting there watching her during daylight. Checking on her in the darkness had been easier and she couldn't see him in the dark, but now... He didn't know what would happen to her mind once she saw his face clearly. 

Telling himself that was a small comfort. He could just avoid her until she was healed enough to leave. 

A breathless small whimper was the only warning he got before Sakura turned herself sleepily on her back just as he had previously dreaded. 

His eyebrows rose at the sudden unexpected sight he got. If he wanted to move before to leave, he was sadly mistaken because once more he was frozen still on the chair.

The heat that rushed to his cheeks was uncontrollable. He could keep a calm facade but he couldn't hide that awkward reaction when seeing her pale breasts free of bindings exposed to him and looking firm and round with the moisture of her sweat giving them a lewd shine. Her rosy nipples pebbled to hardness at finally no longer being pressed down and hidden on his sheets and he wanted to curse out loud in taking notice of even _that_ minor detail because he was too intuned to her every move. 

Her breasts weren't big but weren't small. He would have thought she was on the smaller side thanks to her binding them yet seeing them now uncovered and heaving with her pained quick breaths, he was proven wrong. 

He shouldn't be seeing her this way. This was Sakura. An _unconscious_ Sakura. He hated the reaction she was getting from him at just the sight of her chest. He was still a teen, but not so young as to react like a small boy accidentally seeing breasts for the first time. 

His curious stare at her chest hardened into a glare aimed at her face. Sakura was lucky the only physical reaction she had gotten was a surprised blush. The rest of his body was numbed to everything else.

He didn't know what that _thing_ could do at seeing her like that. 

She had a pronounced frown on her face, perhaps due to her wounds touching his sheets. She was probably very sore and he could see her eyelids slightly moving without opening which in on itself could be a small blessing. 

Taking advantage of the fact that she still hadn't opened her eyes, Sasuke felt like gritting his teeth when he stiffly rose from his seat and leaned over her softly whimpering half naked body to grab her upper arm with the intention of turning her back on her stomach. It was the least he could do for her since in some way it had been _him_ that brought her there. 

However that small consideration had been his mistake. The instant his one remaining hand touched her sleek smooth skin, the sight of her panting blushing face and rising and falling breasts underneath his leaning form began to blur until everything was blackened as if his eyes had been completely covered by a dark cloth. All he could do was _feel_ her supple flesh under his gripping fingers as his nostrils flared in something akin to fury.

His teeth lengthened and cut his lower lip. The unexpected sting almost brought his sight back, however it didn't stop a very uncomfortable sensation he had been fearing from growing and making him too painfully aware. 

Between his legs he felt a damning tightening and ache. He was hardening and lengthening under the cloth of his pants until the cloth strained under the pressure. He hid his shock as his length gave a firm twitch inside his pants. 

Sakura was still so annoyingly unaware of what situation she was in. He almost wanted to shake her and yell at her to wake up and just leave. 

Thoughts, _disgusting_ thoughts rushed through his mind. Thoughts of hurting her and shoving that stiffening  _thing_ inside of her suddenly had him gasping and biting down harder to make his teeth hurt him further to keep some form of sanity intact. 

Becoming more angered by the unwanted arousal he made an annoyed sound and sharply turned Sakura on her stomach while still unable to fully see her. He was aware that his actions were harsh and uncaring of her weakened state. He felt angry at himself yet took it out on her for it which only worsened his confusion about having her near. 

The sudden movement had her yelp in shock and before she could even question him about his presence, he fled the room. 

If he could he'd never come back to that room. He'd do anything to not go back to it. Not while _she_ was there. 

In the recent past, he had entertained the thought of coming back to the village someday to take Sakura with him in his journey but he had never once pictured she'd be the one to find him while he was having a more chaotic struggle than before. 

A struggle of his own creation. 

If he hadn't killed her before, he could certainly kill her now and he wouldn't be able to stop it. And the _thing_ wanted her more than anything. It wasn't just the hunger to get her out of the way, but to take _all_ of her into itself. It wasn't spiritual or loving but _hateful_. A hatefulness that rivaled his hunger for revenge in the past. 

The creature wanted to consume everything that is Sakura to make itself complete. There was a _desperation_ to its need. 

It knew who she was and couldn't let her live. 

 

*****

 

Sakura was stunned. She blinked repeatedly at the opened doorway of the room she was residing in. The door had been slammed open with such an impossible speed that she could bet the wall behind it had a hole punched in from the force. 

Next to her borrowed bed, she could see a simple wooden chair knocked on its side as if its former inhabitant had knocked it over hastily in his or her fleeing. 

 _Did I imagine someone here?_ , her thoughts were sluggish and she didn't feel any better from the day before. Trying to relax on the bed was easier said than done now that the door was wide open and she was half naked in a house full of strangers. 

Closing her eyes, she willed herself to calm down. The jarring sensation of being roughly moved on the bed and hearing the loud crack of the door opening and slamming against the wall made her wake up disoriented with her heart racing in fear. 

 _My back is still not doing well, my chakra is shot for now...,_ mentally listing what her body was feeling to evaluate her healing process, her breath hitched at something she hadn't noticed before regarding her body. 

Something that hadn't been there the previous night. 

There was a _wetness_ on her upper left arm. That area ached with a sting and she could feel the wetness slowly ooze out to soak the sheets under her. 

Whatever calmness she had gathered disappeared as she realized that what she felt on that arm were fresh claw marks that had been dug into her skin. 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry I took so long, guys! You can chew me out in @bitchymuggle in tumblr. T-T
> 
> Will take me awhile to get back onboard of writing regularly again, but I'll try.


	5. Awakening

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Warning cos Sasuke is having some serious confusion and internal issues about what he's feeling so some vague pervy thoughts might show up. This chapter was kinda meh cos I just wanted to establish some things in this universe before continuing.

Sakura's healing progress was agonizingly slow. The time she spent on that bed with nothing to do other than lay there only helped create a nervousness she couldn't shake off because her mind was far too exhausted to fight it. 

She was worried about her teammates. After that one night, that boy, Sasuke, hadn't come back to tell her if they had found them yet and she feared that she had made a mistake in telling him anything at all. She didn't know him or any of those people there. Having them taking her in and tending to her wasn't enough for her to say they were good or trustworthy. 

Bad people were capable of doing good deeds but that didn't change the fact that they were still able to do wrong...

 _Not_ knowing was putting her on edge and making her assume things that could be far from the truth. 

The persistent stiffness she felt on her sore tired shoulders and the nagging feeling of suspicion was just a part of her hyper vigilance as a kunoichi. Ever since she had become aware of being wounded and surrounded by strangers, she refused to let down her guard every time she awoke from one of her fevered dreams. 

They _could_ simply be good people too and her fear was just her being paranoid. Her rationalizing kept going back and forth to give her fear some relief from that anxious feeling that refused to go away. 

_Its just being vigilant._

Despite telling herself these things, she still could tell  _something_  about that place was off. It was an unhealthy dose of discomfort of being in an unfamiliar place. There was quiet watchful tension that was keeping her apprehensive with only her groggy eyes staring warily at the walls of the otherwise empty room. 

Something was watching her. There was a silent intent and no matter how much she looked around with her limited visual range, she couldn't find the origin of what was observing her when she was supposed to be alone. 

Mental self-preservation had its downsides. She could either close herself completely off or become too open. 

Or so paranoid she _thought_ something was out to get her. 

Being both a medic and kunoichi had her trying to come up with logical answers to explain her increasing dread in that quiet room. That fevers can cause hallucinations or even some brain damage. Even forgetfulness.

That was partly the reason she wrote off the fresh clawing on her upper arm as something she _might_ have missed in the beginning. With her foggy memory, the deep indents in her skin could have been there since that night. 

Just paranoia and a fever. There possibly _couldn't_ be anything wrong with that place. That sense of foreboding was just a mind trick created by stress and her body fighting off an infection. 

She hoped that was _all_ it was. Her chakra was slowly and steadily returning but it wasn't nearly enough for her to heal herself, much less get out of there. 

There was truly nothing to do in that room other than sleep whenever the mysterious fever caused by those claw marks on her back overtook her. The only breaks in her 'routine' of sleep, fearful suspicions and mentally cursing her slow chakra replenishing, was Mikoto coming to see to her needs. 

The woman was a godsend and too polite to say anything that would make Sakura's needing her assistance too humiliating, although that didn't stop Sakura from being extremely embarrassed. She was already eighteen and there she was needing help like an infant. 

Depending on others to survive brought her an unfamiliar pain that felt too personal for her tastes. Sakura couldn't remember a time she was so helpless and yet... It was too _intimate_ and felt like an old wound had been reopened. A wound to something she couldn't place and was too tired to seek in her memories. 

She knew she was strong. Physically _strong_. No matter how much Sakura raked her mind, she couldn't once remember a time she was weak and needed help. She was a top medic, a kunoichi that studied under a powerful sannin and could punch craters into the ground with the force of her chakra. She fought on par beside Naruto that had Kurama within him and they worked well together. 

However, that _pain_ of being weak was getting under her skin like something she had felt keenly before and had been erased. 

_Where was it coming from?_

In spite of her negative feelings towards being looked after, she was grateful and respectful with everything Mikoto did for her. Perhaps it was because the older woman was a mother that had experience with caring for others or her extreme patience with the temporary limitations Sakura had that finally made her let down some of her guard. 

It was a dumb move. She was sure if her friends back in Konoha knew that she was letting herself grow fond of a stranger when in an unknown and possibly hostile place, they'd call her an idiot with a death wish. 

Mikoto wasn't loud like Ino or Naruto. She had a tranquil personality and a mature caring aura that felt genuine. As if Sakura was one of her children. Letting her defenses down had almost been natural. 

It made Sakura homesick although her own mother was a loud fussy sort that would check on her every five minutes. At least back when she was still a small child with no medical training. 

Strangely though, despite Mikoto's calming presence when checking on her and helping her with basic necessities, she still couldn't stop feeling uneasy. There _still_ was something unseen permeating that house and she didn't know how to acknowledge it or if it even was real.  

There was nothing noticeably suspicious about the room she was in. It was plain with white walls and blue bedding. It almost looked unused, with nothing personal of the person it belonged to within sight. There were no picture frames on top of the dressers or books on the shelves. There was an _empty_ feel to it even though Sakura was inhabiting the room itself. If Mikoto hadn't told her it belonged to her son Sasuke, Sakura would have thought it was just some unused guestroom. 

Being alone for prolonged periods of time like this wasn't good for her mind. She wasn't being greedy for attention but yes to have at least _some_ more human contact to be put at ease with whatever could be happening in the outside world that she was cut off from. 

Maybe _then_ that annoying heaviness of being watched at all moments would go away. 

Mikoto answered her questions but all her answers felt like they were leading to a dead end. She wasn't going to blame the other woman for it because with how regularly she went to check on her, Sakura could only guess she was barely leaving the house to take care of her. 

_What about her son Sasuke?_

Sakura couldn't bring herself to ask about that mysterious boy in the dark that had barely spoken to her. That still didn't stop her from wondering about him and if he knew anything she might need to know. He had made it sound like he was going to look for the rest of her team so he _had_ to have some news or have seen something of interest in those woods. 

By what she guessed felt like her sixth day there, she became frustrated with said unfamiliar boy. It was an intense frustration that shocked her. 

He was obviously staying away. Not _once_ had she seen him again. It was as if he had completely vanished, leaving her alone in that impersonal room. Like he couldn't be bothered with her and she was just some bug he was avoiding out of disgust. 

_Why am I feeling so much anger towards him? I don't even know him to be this mad._

It was on the seventh day that she gathered enough to courage to ask Mikoto about her absent son. It had been on the day in which Sakura had finally been able to get out of that bed and take a very needed shower on her own, though her movements had been sluggish and downright painful to do. Just those simple acts felt like she had ran a marathon and her face was red with guilt at the sight of Mikoto patiently waiting for her to return to the bed. 

"Sasuke?" the woman asked softly, those dark familiar eyes showing some brief confusion once Sakura was carefully settled on some pillows now that her back was healed enough to lay on her back. 

Not knowing how to explain, Sakura bit her lower lip, wondering if she was going to get that boy in trouble if she mentioned he had been in the room once. 

 _Well it is_ his _room, so..._

"He... He was here some days ago...," Mikoto's eyes only widened a fraction and instantly Sakura regretted saying anything. She was literally telling the kind woman her son had casually walked into his room with a half naked girl on his bed. 

Composing herself and quickly hiding that look of maternal alarm, Mikoto bowed her head in apology, "I hope he didn't behave rudely towards you-"

"No, no, Mikoto-san!" she flinched at the dismissive squeak of her voice and how out of reflex she wildly waved her hands out in front of her when her body was still sore. 

"He didn't do anything indecent! All he did was get some clothes and ask me some questions!" Sakura's rush of nervous words to convince the woman had her smiling awkwardly. With her facial muscles not being used for awhile, her 'smile' felt so painfully lopsided on her lips that she began asking herself why she even tried. 

Mikoto finally looked up and showed small hints of relief. 

"That's good to hear. I still have to apologize because he was aware of your state of undress and still came here-"

 _Wait! What?! He said he hadn't seen anything!_ , Sakura's mouth opened and closed like a gaping fish out of water. 

"When him and Itachi brought you in, he was the one that put you on his bed and cut off the rest of your clothes to check your wounds-"

_Crap! Crap! He-He did that?!_

"I hadn't ever seen him so worried before and that's what kept me from getting him out of the room the first day," to Sakura's alarm Mikoto bowed her head in apology once more. 

_This guy I don't even know..._

It was confusing. From what little she knew of Sasuke's night visit that one time, his voice had been flat and uncaring. He didn't seem like the sort that would become frantically worried or would lose that annoying coldness over some wounded strange girl he had found. 

 _Though I don't know him I think it's now my turn to apologize to him._ , with an awkward silence following Mikoto's revelation, Sakura felt a nagging tinge of guilt. 

She was frustrated with a guy that had probably saved her life for no reason. Who knows what would have happened to her if she hadn't been discovered by him while her body was bleeding, exhausted and with little to no chakra on the forest floor. 

"Um... Its alright, Mikoto-san. You don't need to apologize. He helped me," the stiff shoulders of the woman bowing next to her borrowed bed visibly relaxed when Sakura murmured those words. 

"I...," she started as Mikoto looked at her questioningly, waiting for her next words," I just wanted to thank him."

 _I want to know if he's found out anything but a 'thank you' is order since he definitely did save me._  

 *****

It was warm outside. It wasn't an annoying warmth that made clothes stick to the body but a perfect warmth. _Too_ perfect in Sasuke's opinion. 

It was that perfect everyday and he couldn't remember the last time he saw cloudiness or rain. An unnatural unchanging atmosphere of comfortable warmth that sometimes grated on his nerves.  

Everything around him was as it should be and that was one of the reasons why he stayed out of his family home most of the day, only to come back when he needed sleep in a spare room on the first floor.

The room that would have originally had a slowly recuperating Sakura hadn't he on impulse put her on his own bed. 

"Mother is worried about you. You've been staying out of the house more than before," Sasuke couldn't prevent a shiver from going down his spine upon hearing that familiar voice speak out behind him. 

 _Itachi is different..._ , balling his right hand into a fist, Sasuke didn't respond nor turn around to look at his older brother that he was certain was studying his reactions quietly without the intention of pointing them out. 

"We're all worried. You've changed recently," his body shuddered at the irony of those words.

"You won't talk to us, won't eat dinner with us. What's going on, Sasuke?" he almost caved into those questions. A part of him desperately wanted to expose the thing he thought was an insulting farce to his memory of them while another, more selfish part, didn't want to break the illusion . 

 _Are these people_ really _them?_

He knew what he'd see if he turned around to look at Itachi. He'd see the same face, lined with tiredness and the all too familiar pitch black eyes similar to his own staring back at him with an unreadable sense of calm. 

His brother acted no differently than how he was the night before _it_ had happened. The night in which the Uchiha compound had its walls covered in the blood of his kin and the streets had been littered with the bodies of people he had known during his first years of life. 

The man behind him was still Itachi yet it was a _different_ Itachi. Sasuke recalled him as a child, and noted that he acted as he used to as if that tragic blood scented night in the past had never happened or had crossed his mind. 

His family was safe, normal and the only one being tortured by these 'memories' was him and him alone. In the beginning, Sasuke had thought that maybe he had dreamt the massacre and that a place like Konoha hadn't ever existed. That he didn't know a Naruto and hadn't left a blushing girl named Sakura at the gates of that distant village with an inner promise to see her soon. 

He had almost forgotten it all when surrounded by the warmth and the normalcy of having his family back and seeing the same walls of his old home and having them happy and so irritatingly _normal_ like all that bloodshed and tragedy was just a product of his imagination. 

 _Nothing is normal about this at all. At least not after we found her.,_ he admitted it though it hurt him. Itachi still gave off that brotherly presence from his once innocent childhood past but was he _truly_ Itachi? How could he be Itachi if he didn't mention the war, him being resurrected and saying one final goodbye before leaving him alone with only the lingering feeling of having his forehead pressed against his?

Just coming back to that moment in the past had Sasuke's vision of the stone wall in front of him blur. The only place he felt safe was close to the high walls protecting the compound even though he didn't venture outside the safety of those walls unless it was nighttime.

He didn't want to think that the man that was currently talking to him wasn't Itachi yet he feared that it was and that him and everyone else in that walled in clan in the middle of the woods had somehow been _damaged_. 

When he had first found Sakura due to him still having traces of the creature's nightly activities fresh in his mind, it had been like cold water thrown at his face that woke him out of what he thought was his true reality. 

To him Sakura had been just a part of his dreams because that was how his mind had decided to cope with having his clan return intact. Seeing her again was what brought the cruelty of the reality he'd left behind back to him.

Because he'd almost started to forget her and the others. His _old_ life. That life that had seemed like a nightmare with only brief hints of happiness cutting through the dark. 

It had been instinct that had told him she wouldn't remember him because his clan didn't remember anything themselves. With them, life was normal and uncomplicated until a certain hour of night fell and even after those moments, they showed no hints during the day of anything being out of place. 

_What have I done?_

"Sasuke...?" he could sense his brother's worry and he almost gave into that urge again. The urge to just blurt out all of his thoughts. 

But would saying anything shatter that perfect world and leave him alone again? 

The fear of that had him pressing his lips into a thin line. He felt the _thing_ inside of him purr in satisfaction at the safety it felt with him keeping those thoughts silent. 

"Everything is fine," it cost him a lot to force those words out and he could feel an uncomfortable heat on his back as Itachi stared hard at him, probably aware that he was lying. 

Because he was. He _knew_ he was. He didn't feel his clan were the ones that were a danger towards Sakura. The only danger she was unknowingly facing was him knowing she was in his room, vulnerable and too _close_. 

For the last couple of nights he'd been dangerously close to going back into that room. Grotesque blood drenched fantasies that he knew weren't his own had been plaguing him since he'd found her. 

Although his violent thoughts weren't the only thing that made him blanche with discomfort. When he was finally far away enough from her and the house, _other_ thoughts would come to his mind. 

 Thoughts of touching her, of wanting to wash off her sweat and how she had panted with exertions from her fever underneath him when he wanted to turn her on her stomach to give her some modesty was what tortured him once he was far away enough. 

If it wasn't the creature, it was _him_ thinking of taking advantage of her weakened state when she probably saw him as nothing more than some stranger.

Sasuke had wanted to crawl on top of Sakura. To cup her breasts, harshly pinch her nipples and lap up her sweat. It was after he had left the house in a desperate rush that day that his thoughts went from violent to lustful curiosity about her body and how far she'd let him go. 

The realization of it made him feel like he was no different than the creature itself. 

He might not want to kill or harm Sakura but he wanted to still do things to her even without her consent and that was what truly brought the burning sensation of nausea up his throat. Sasuke wasn't the kind to have fantasies or think of sex. In the past he'd been too busy concentrating on his goal to give sex any thought and now that it was all over, it came to mind crudely when he saw a panting red faced Sakura on his bed and her breasts moving up and down in the quickened frantic motions of her breathing. 

Itachi eventually changed the subject sensing that Sasuke's quietness was something he had to bare alone which wasn't far from the truth. 

It was dusk when that awkward half of a conversation, if he could even call his lack of responses a 'conversation' at all, was over. Sasuke reluctantly returned home alone and felt a misplaced sudden anger clench at his lower belly as soon as he stepped through the front door. 

He had been expecting it. It had happened everyday since he'd watched her in her sleep. 

 _Damn it! Damn it!,_ glaring into the empty entry room that lead to the rest of his house, he stiffened in the empty doorway without completely entering the house. This wasn't a simple annoyance but a rage that made him yearn to run to her just to _watch_ her again like some piece of meat to consume. 

Taking deep breaths, he closed his eyes and tried to push out the knowledge of her being inside that house from his thoughts.

Snapping his eyes open he grimaced in distaste when looking down at the front of his pants and seeing the evidence of his lustful thinking there. He had completely hardened and it would be difficult to hide it from anyone at first glance. The offending engorged appendage stuck out vulgarly that even his loose pants couldn't hide its length. 

He now absolutely _hated_ having that curiosity about her body piqued. 

_Damn her why is she here?!_

The anger within him surged until his whole body became hot with it. He was familiarized with that consuming anger. It was one of the prices he had to pay. Feeling the anger and helplessness for not fulfilling his goal. The desire to get everyone out of his way to feel some sense of peace. 

That old unwanted rage coupled with arousal had him squeezing the wooden doorframe to hold himself in place. 

Not having any solutions for this situation, Sasuke sharply turned around to leave his house, abandoning the idea of going inside for the rest of the day or week or _fucking_ month as long as Sakura was inside.  

He didn't even bother to close the door behind him in his quick departure. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know what y'all are thinking but don't worry, lol. Sasuke won't force himself on Sakura. When it happens it'll be consensual tho the current issue he has is a very nasty sexual awakening tainted by what's inside of him. 
> 
> He's horny. There I finally said it. And he doesn't know what he should feel about it when he's got something so cruel making him almost completely unable to approach Sakura. 
> 
> To put it simply, he's extremely sexually frustrated. Its like his early puberty got paused and then suddenly released with a very intense want to do it, (͡° ͜ʖ ͡°).
> 
> He'll be an asshole cos of it too so be warned. He won't be exactly sweet to Sakura while he's afraid of the creature so Sakura might straight up call him an asshole cos she doesn't even remember him. To her he'll just be some very pretty and impossibly rude anti social boy that doesn't want her near him. 
> 
> The next chapter might have Sasuke 'fixing' his problem somewhat. He'll have to eventually do that often. I had thought of making it smutty for him or him doing something painful to himself to curb the urges. Haven't decided yet.
> 
> NOTE: I delete my replies to comments with each update to not mess up the review count with my own comments cos AO3 still counts them in.


	6. Meeting

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sasuke and Sakura 'meet' for the first time! Finally! Hurray! Warnings for mentions of self harm and er, Sasuke playing with himself. Sorry.

_Leaving scars is an understatement.,_ Sakura's neck was sore from her trying to get a good look at her back on the small dresser mirror. _Feeling_ the wounds wasn't enough to tell her the full extent of the damage she had gotten. 

She winced at the sight being reflected on the glass. The clawing on her back had finally closed and stopped feeling a sharp soreness but the long jagged lines were an ugly contrast on her pale skin. They weren't pale or red scars, but a sickly purple that looked more like a _brand_ than closed lacerations. 

It was the first time she'd seen scars of that color. It wasn't the purple of muscle under the flesh, but a bruise that she didn't feel. The long ugly lines went from the back of her neck down to her tailbone. It was as if the thing that had clawed her had kunais for nails. 

_If it had hit me any harder with those sharp nails, I'm sure it could have pierced right through me easily. Like a hot knife through butter._

Turning her head around she slumped in defeat, resting her bottom against the dresser while crossing her arms under her naked breasts. Since it was only Mikoto that visited her in that room, Sakura wasn't being particularly shy about her state of half undress since the other woman had already seen her chest, much to her embarrassment. 

_And I haven't been given any clothes other than a robe. The only clothes I have close by are inside the dressers and those belong to that guy Sasuke._

Heat rushed to her cheeks at the thought of even _thinking_ of taking that guy's clothes to sneak out of the house with a goodbye note. If she resorted to that she'd have to leave stealthily and quickly so no one would see her, least of all the owner of said clothes himself. If she was caught she'd have a lot of embarrassing explaining to do, including having to endure her aversion to saying goodbye. 

She had lost count of how many more days she had been inside that room, but now she felt enough strength to leave. 

_I'm a coward because I can't even say goodbye face to face. Or a thank you..._

She had no valid reason to want to leave sneakily. However she knew that she wouldn't be able to say her farewells to Mikoto. It was ridiculous to feel guilty for having to leave yet that was what Sakura felt. For as long as she could remember saying the word goodbye at all left a nasty nostalgic taste in her mouth. It was stale in flavor. 

_Goodbye, bye, see you later, see you soon..._

No matter the way it was said, words of parting just got under her skin and she didn't know when or how it started. 

Writing it in a _note_ was the best way to leave. 

Shivering, she sighed picking up the discarded borrowed robe she had allowed to pool at her feet when she decided to check on her back. Putting it on silently, her eyes narrowed with determination. 

_First some parchment, then some clothes and my things because I can't travel without weapons. I've already had enough trouble for being separated from my team._

Sakura hated to look through other people's things, but under these circumstances she had to, or so she told herself to not go through the awkwardness of leaving the place with people watching her. 

She kept her face devoid of expression when beginning to open one of the top drawers of the dresser she had been standing in front of. Most people kept some random things on the top drawers rather than clothes. 

 _Or they just have their undies there which is what I do_ -, her hand abruptly stopped opening the top drawer halfway when that thought came to mind. She was grateful for being alone when blushing her face off because she could probably come across that guy's _underwear_ when simply snooping around for something to write with. 

Scowling, she grinded her teeth for her momentary stupidity. She was alone and he probably wouldn't care if she saw that. If he _did_ care, he would have emptied out his drawers in the first place. 

_And Naruto's apartment is a pigsty. I've seen enough of his boxers to last me a couple of lifetimes. I keep telling him if he never cleans up after himself he'll never get a girlfriend-!_

Realizing she was stalling and spending too much time glaring at her unmoving hand on the handle of the partially opened drawer, Sakura sighed loudly again. Inwardly complaining about Naruto's habits made her feel somewhat like her old self again. It was a comforting thought but just _standing_ there mentally going off wasn't helping her set off for her departure. 

Straightening her shoulders, she finished opening the drawer too loudly and her eyes widened at what she found. The contents inside only told her that she was right about the annoying suspicion that the Uchihas might not be ordinary civilians. Especially after Mikoto recognized she was a kunoichi from the first day they'd met. 

Weapons. Shuriken, kunai, wires, gloves, the whole drawer had them neatly sorted and separated from each other. She almost felt guilty for opening the thing so roughly because she disorganized the neat small sections settled inside. That Sasuke guy must keep them close to his bed probably in preparation of a potential attack. It was a preventive tactic. 

Keeping the dresser by the bed, with the drawer closest with some basic weapons that could be snatched up in a hurry...

_Ninja. I should have known. Why didn't Mikoto say anything?_

Most importantly was the village she was in under some sort of threat? It looked like overkill to have so many weapons nearby an area to sleep in your own home. Either Sasuke was paranoid of sleeping without something to defend himself on hand or the whole _place_ was a target. 

Sakura knew of war and feuds. That could be why he had those things handy. 

Perturbed only slightly, she decided it was none of her business. She had been imposing on this family long enough and she needed to leave. 

Closing the drawer she moved to the next one, hoping to finally find what she was searching for. 

A rather hateful thought came to mind. It was that lingering heaviness of distrust that she couldn't simply ignore anymore. 

_Why haven't they said anything about Naruto and Kakashi-sensei? They could have told me they found nothing and yet I haven't heard anything on it. Have they done something...?_

Her hands started to nervously tremble unbeknownst to her as she went through the motions of rummaging through some neatly folded shirts. She didn't want to make a mess of the clothes so after searching through them, she needed to smooth them down as they once were as her heart felt a brief sharp pain at seeing the clan symbol on the shirts. 

Mikoto had placed the clothes with the symbol looking up. As if it was _important_ for the person opening that drawer to see it as some sort of reminder with the symbol repeating itself in perfectly folded compact rows. 

An uchiwa fan. White and red. Fans that were commonly used to fan fires into growing. 

_Their name is Uchiha so this is obviously their..._

It bothered her. She didn't have thoughts on it yet she was definitely showing signs of physical distress when she noticed how her fingers twitched when flattening those shirts down once again. 

Her fingertips just skimming over one of the fans decorating the cloth felt a quick sharp pinch that had her yanking her hand back quickly to her chest. 

_No parchment here!_

Shaking her head, she closed that drawer gently as to not disturb her 'clean up' job and continued her search. 

_If I have to take clothes, it'd probably be best something without that fan. I don't know these people enough to take such liberties and stealing from them is bad enough as it is._

Wincing inwardly, she rephrased the word _stealing_. 

All she was going to do was _borrow_ some of Sasuke's clothes and use some writing materials _if_ she ever found any. 

*****

Self disgust had Sasuke grimacing like he was in pain when what he was physically feeling was a revolting pleasure he needed to get over with. It was more like a chore to him to do it now but the relief after the act was what kept him returning to the solitude of the downstairs bathroom to 'fix' his ailment. 

He was almost growing _dependent_ on the euphoria that manner of 'soothing' gave to him. 

Closing his eyes, he clenched his teeth to restrain any sound that might come out to betray him. He didn't want to look down at what his hand was doing. He was already waiting for a wave of shame to come over him once he had panted out his mind numbing release.

Keeping his eyes closed might have hid his embarrassment with what he was doing, but seeing only the darkness behind his eyelids made _her_ come to mind. 

Angry about her face, her voice, and quite literally her _everything_ reappearing in his thoughts, he opened his eyes and forced himself to look down at his gliding hand as a form of self punishment.  

He was so hard and so close it _hurt_. He probably looked ridiculous glaring down at his cock with his cheeks flushed as his breaths increased with speed in desperation to be done with it. 

His body obviously liked it. Sasuke's mind didn't. 

Unwilling to admit his enjoyment only helped delay his orgasm. This hadn't been the first time his thinking had made it take too long. 

His length was wet. The first time he'd been surprised at how much lubricant he released with each experimental stroke, and how the wetness helped his gripping hand slide with ease. The liquid seeping slowly out of his small opening at the head had an almost salt like smell. 

Gulping, Sasuke almost stopped because a small sound almost left his lips. He was embarrassed by the low whimper that had bubbled in his throat for a moment. 

Frustrated, he stroked faster, tightening his grip on the throbbing flesh that was beginning to flush red at its head with excitement. 

He didn't dare close his eyes or think of _her_ this time. This was only a _physical_ activity like putting on clothes or brushing his teeth. It was nothing he should make too personal. 

Besides that he didn't know if permitting fantasies of her to take over him while forcing an orgasm on himself would be the wise thing to do. 

When he felt a tightening on his balls, he hissed under his breath and twisted his slippery hold while aiming his seed down at the water awaiting it. His whole body trembled with the force of it but there was an _emptiness_ to the pleasure as if something vital was missing from it. 

_Whatever... It does the trick._

Breathing heavily yet silently, he removed his hand from his softening erection and rested it on the tiled wall above the toilet he was standing in front of. 

Once he'd calmed down he would flush the foggy now diluted semen floating in the once clear water and would pretend he hadn't done it _again_. 

His sex that once had been throbbing with an addictive heat was growing cold as it lost the rush of blood that had made it stand upright once before. It was now hanging limply in front of his opened pants with only a droplet of what he had ejaculated still on its opening. 

He didn't need to look in a mirror to feel like some coward that pleasured himself no differently than some kid just discovering his erection for the very first time. 

_Which is not too far from the truth..._

Taking one final deep breath, he straightened himself and flushed the contents inside the toilet bowl before lowering the lid. Leaving everything as he had found it before going inside for what was becoming now his routine. 

There were two ways to get the creature to stop. One was pain and the other was _this_. 

Sasuke would have been perfectly fine with using pain as a method to restrain _it_ if he hadn't seen the knowing sad expression on his mother's face when he had come to dinner after he had done it. The only hints he got from his father and brother were deep cool searching looks before they went through with eating their meal without any necessary talking. 

He had intentionally hurt himself when in the guest room. Took a kunai and had cut on his thigh only enough to make it sting in warning for the overexcited creature that kept urging him to attack Sakura. 

It had been drastic. That much he knew. Yet he felt a malicious satisfaction beyond the burning pain of his opened skin after the first cut.  

The creature had been yelling in a outrage so loud Sasuke was surprised it's beastly screams hadn't left his own mouth. It's anger was brief and almost consuming him but when the second neat cut on his already bloodied thigh came, the anger turned to an intense feeling of whimpering vulnerability. 

He would have felt bad had that _thing_ kept itself in check. It was too influenced by what Sasuke felt and only intensified and twisted his feelings into something morbid that was unlike himself. 

Sasuke had enough of it. 

However, even though pain took care of it quickly, somehow his family had _known_. He had been unable to look at them as his thigh throbbed under some bandaging and the cloth of his pants while they regarded him quietly yet still desperately _trying_ to act normally like they did at every dinner.

The dinner table had been nearly silent. It wasn't unusual since his father wasn't much for talking. He was a practical man that saw things as they needed to be seen and to him dinner time was to eat, not to converse.  Certainly his brother and mother said some things and his father would give his one word answers when he felt the need to...

Yet that didn't change the fact that on that particular night when Sasuke sat at the table with bleeding cuts on his thigh covered from their sight,  his family had been more subdued. Their disappointment with him had been palpable. 

How could he look at them then? He couldn't very well tell them he was _cutting_ himself to feel better. 

They _knew_ and he had to use the _other_  way as much as it sickened him.  

Tucking himself back into his pants in resignation in the present time and making sure he hadn't stained the cloth in front of them, Sasuke finally relaxed the tension on his shoulders...

Only to tense up again with awareness upon hearing the smallest of _clicks_ somewhere in the house. 

Narrowing his eyes he stayed perfectly still and alert to note if any more sounds came. 

Soft thumps of bare feet on wooden floorboards. His brows rose at realizing that _Sakura_ was actually moving upstairs. The knowledge of it had the fine hairs on the back of his neck rise but thankfully the creature was silent and purring in the back of his mind due to his previous activities.  

Steeling himself for what was to come, Sasuke left the bathroom quietly. He had to hand it to Sakura for being silent. Any _other_ ninja would have probably missed those tiny low noises, but with him having lived through a war and being in a constant state of threat, nothing much could slip past him. 

Especially not coming from the girl that had been far too much in his thoughts until he felt no choice other than harming himself or masturbating like some degenerate that couldn't control himself. 

The rush of anger he felt at how _low_ he had stooped just to not hurt her came only for a second. It subsided so quickly that he thought he'd imagined it. 

 _She's coming downstairs_..., knowing that and just _sensing_ her near because he was too freakishly focused on her presence, Sasuke stayed in the doorway between the dinning room and sitting room, just waiting for her to appear.

He almost regretted staying when he saw her quietly go into the sitting room. She was wearing the clothes he usually wore to sleep. Just a dark shirt without the clan symbol and some loose shorts. The clothes were somewhat baggy on her and she had the front of the shorts only held by one of her fists clenching a small knot at its front. 

She looked almost comical tiptoeing cautiously with her recently washed pink hair that had been messily finger combed and wearing his clothes. Clothes that were even too big for him because he didn't like feeling too restrained by tight clothing to move. 

He let himself wonder how the _old_ Sakura would react to knowing he was watching her so intently at that moment. 

Though it would have all been humorous, Sasuke wasn't smiling. Far from it. 

"What are you doing?"

*****

"Shit!" the curse left her mouth like a reflex when Sakura heard the deep cold voice behind her. She hadn't sensed anyone in the house when she decided it was time to look for her weapons and medicine pouch because she couldn't bring herself to take from Sasuke's stash. 

Her loud curse and her visible jump was met with silence from the person standing behind her. 

 _Damn it. Might as well fess up..._ , tensing herself only slightly to face the one who had caught her, Sakura turned around and was soon rendered speechless. 

A young man her age stared back at her with a detached disinterest that almost stung. But that wasn't what took away her ability to form words. 

_Kami, he's beautiful._

He had a cold and somewhat unnerving beauty. Despite the sitting room being dim in lighting, she knew his one exposed eye was black just like Mikoto's. In fact she could see some of Mikoto in his delicate features. 

_This must be Sasuke._

She should have remembered her manners when staring at him dumbly. His hair was as black as his eye, with some obvious spiking and it looked like he was letting his bangs grow out in length to cover the left eye she couldn't see. 

The one black eye that did look back at her with no feeling was almond shaped and sharp. The blackness of it almost gave it an otherworldly shine. 

"I asked you a question," Sasuke, or who she was assuming _was_ Sasuke, was attractive in appearance but his tone had the underlining emphasis of _annoyance_ to it. The sound of it broke the spell she somehow had been under and she blushed in mortification for having practically gawked at him as if she hadn't seen a pretty boy before. 

"I was... I was just looking for my things!" she tried to make her voice sound light and it only came out like a frightened squeak when being intensely looked down on by the quiet boy. 

"You must be Sasuke-san. Am I right?" That last bit was only added in to get rid of some of tense awkwardness between them and she was starting to mentally kick herself when she got a reaction from him. 

It was almost missed by her, but his eye widened and a muscle on his pale cheek seemed to pulse as if he were about to speak but was stopping himself. Whatever that reaction was, it soon vanished before she could even begin figuring it out. 

"Yes, I am. And you're... Sakura."

It was simple. No added suffixes. Just her name spoken in his voice. It was as if he was _meant_ to say her name and it gave her a warmth even though his tone had been cool when uttering it. 

Silence continued again. Sakura felt like she was about to be executed or being appraised in some way even though his gaze was staring directly into her own and nowhere else. Unfeeling as that stare may be, she couldn't deny it was sharp enough to see right through her. 

"I'll find you some better fitting clothes," those were his final words to her before he in a coolly dismissive way left her standing there stunned in his family's sitting room to go upstairs. 

 _What a strange guy...,_ were her thoughts as her eyes stared after him. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know its mean of me but I cackled writing Sakura saying "Sasuke-san". How must have Sasuke felt hearing her calling him that instead of "kun". *wheeze* 
> 
> He looked like he was going to say something but didn't, lol. (Sorry, Sasuke )
> 
> A special thanks go out to all the ones reviewing and giving kudos, subscriptions and bookmarks! (That goes out to the private bookmarks too)
> 
> And if you're wondering why Sakura is feeling and thinking the way she does, remember she had all her memories of Sasuke erased and REPLACED with new memories. 
> 
> This Sakura is still the same, but she doesn't remember loving Sasuke, being in the same team as him, and fighting to bring him back with Naruto. 
> 
> She's a little tougher and more battle hardened because even though the war is technically over she still feels the strains of living through war. Seeing death and loss... She might not remember it all yet her personality shows she still feels it. Her paranoia is one of the after effects. She might think it's vigilance but it's more than that. Her memory loss has created its own set of issues with her too. 
> 
> She feels all this but can't place where its coming from.


	7. Prisoner

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kid Sasuke flashback! And Sakura for some reason can't leave!

_When Sasuke had been twelve he had tried to convince himself that he hated the color pink. By his childlike logic, it was a ridiculous color that drew too much unwanted attention and was completely unsuitable for a ninja._

_That was what he told himself every time he saw_ her _with that bright hair that matched her very name._

_Sakura. Her hair was the exact same color of cherry blossoms in full bloom. Cherry blossoms that spread around slowly like falling snow during the season and made entire streets the same color as her hair._

_He'd seen her around long before they had been assigned to team seven along with that loud obnoxious Naruto. Anyone would have been blind to have missed her. They went to the same school, graduated together and were eventually put on the same team much to his displeasure._

_Sakura didn't have to be flashy or too loud to be seen. It was that annoying_ hair _of hers that drew his attention and whenever he saw her from the corner of his eyes, he'd be further embittered by noting_ other _things about her._

_Her green eyes. They were the color of green apples. The strong tart kind that he didn't particularly like either._

_Yet, he couldn't help noticing the combination of bright colors associated with her. Pink, green and the red of her clothes but he mostly connected that specific shade of pink with her._

_It was distracting. Other things about her were distracting other than her hair but he refused to give those other traits she had any acknowledgement._

_They were stupid little irrelevant things he was too aware of. Like that blush on her cheeks whenever she talked to him that matched her hair perfectly or the sparkle of those apple green eyes. He didn't like how they affected him so he did what he knew best._

_He built an internal wall to separate her from his thoughts._

_In the long run, he knew he was being stubborn. Naruto was harping on about teamwork when Sasuke thought he was better off on his own without either of them on his case, slowing his own progress down. Sakura, on the other hand, was stuck in between._

_She didn't seem to have the drive to become stronger or to fight. Or maybe it wasn't her lack of desire that kept her from contributing greatly to their team at all but... The fact that both him and Naruto were constantly competing to take completely over a mission themselves that truly held Sakura back._

_It tempted Sasuke to someday ditch Naruto and stand back to see if his suspicions about Sakura's halted progress were correct. That maybe_ they _had been holding her back by always squabbling with each other or protecting her._

 _Perhaps_ they _were to blame for her not getting stronger. He wondered if other people had that kind of power over another. The power to keep them weak without them gaining their own power. These were that questions that often had Sasuke himself thinking that maybe being around other people and allowing himself to feel something that wasn't an obsession with vengeance could be holding him back from his full potential._

 _He saw all of that in Sakura with her annoying pink hair and her sweet cheery voice whenever she spoke to him. She was unknowingly serving as an example of his theory that other people could_ indeed _make others weak._

_When his father had been alive, he had been a harsh man. He hadn't been physically abusive and didn't yell, but he didn't have to. He only acknowledged perfection and since Itachi was the ideal, Sasuke was often ignored._

_Being ignored and having his own accomplishments seen as something that wasn't ever good enough in his father's eyes had made Sasuke work harder. He worked harder even though he knew that whatever successes he had would always be in the shadow of his older brother's accomplishments. His small hands had bled from constantly training with his shuriken every time he had free time, he had missed dinner multiple times, making his mother worry and reassure him that he shouldn't be so hard on himself..._

_He had hoped that his father saw him as something to be proud of._

_Thinking of his father now after his death still made Sasuke's blood run cold._

_The hard to please Fugaku was no longer around to serve as a goal to gain approval from using strength and skill. The only thing giving Sasuke any strength at all these days were the words of his brother and his own desire to see him dead._

'You're weak.'

_Sasuke hadn't known how to deal with what he was seeing with Sakura. All he could remember was the form of 'encouragement' he'd gotten from his father and the cruel words his brother had told him as he had sobbed with his mind being broken no differently than the dead and grotesquely sliced up bodies of his kin in his old home._

_In a way he thought he was helping her by being harsh towards her and putting her down coldly as a form of pushing her forward. He, in his mind, saw his actions as justified. As a favor._

_He regretted doing it when he saw her bright smile fade at his cruel words._

_Had he looked like that when he was younger and his father had dismissed something he'd done as if it were nothing to be impressed about?_

_He soon realized that look on her face annoyed him just like everything else that had to do with her did and he pushed it all aside like he'd taught himself from an early age. Worrying about some girl's feelings shouldn't be something he spent time mulling over. There were better things to do like getting stronger and he'd done his part in giving Sakura what he thought was a 'push' to help her stand on her own._

_However, it always bothered him. Whenever he rejected her or said some snide comment, he avoided running into her or saying anything to her at all if they happened to be alone for a couple of moments while on a mission afterwards._

_That still didn't stop him from noticing_ everything _about her. Any small change in her mannerisms, in her voice, he knew_ all _of them._

_As time passed, Sakura finally proved his theory right. It was a lesson that she probably had no idea she had taught him._

_When alone, without them there, Sakura finally stood on her own the best she could to protect both him and Naruto. Once she wasn't held back with coddling or them fighting for who was going to be the best finishing a mission, Sakura was determined to do everything possible to not fail even if her opponent was stronger with more experience._

_Seeing her bruised face and shorn hair lying feet away from her as the sun shone down on her, Sasuke hadn't had any words to say. It had been during the chunin exams that Sakura had that moment to show a willingness to do things on her own. Even with the reek of fear still clinging to her and her body showing betraying shivers when sitting beside him as Naruto was being awoken by the others, she finally had done it._

_His eyes looked away from her to stare at the long strands of hair lying on the dirt not far from them. It reminded him of the fallen cherry blossoms that used to litter all over his old house's front yard as a kid. A pink contrasting with the darkness of dirt and the green of small patches of grass. When he had still been small, before his innocence was shattered by Itachi, he used to love sitting on the porch and watching those pale pink petals descend to the ground._

_It had looked magical to him._

_A tightening filled his chest just by looking at her hacked off hair now. That blossom colored hair he had once claimed he disliked was on the ground like those fallen petals from his earlier,_ happier _memories. It was an unexpected tightening that he couldn't even name back at that time but that he knew was always related to her._

 _The first time he had felt it, it had been in The Land of Waves. When he had been in darkness thinking death had claimed him, the first thing he felt was warmth until he opened his eyes and saw Sakura with her ridiculous pink hair and watery green eyes crying in relief. Somehow she had looked like a beacon in the fog surrounding them on the unfinished bridge and all he heard was_ her _crying, all that he felt was_ her _warmth and all that he saw was_ her _._

_That immediate squeezing sensation was like a warmth grabbing a hold of his heart and reassuring him._

_He couldn't stand it. He made sure that whenever he felt that, he'd write it off as just another symptom of her being an annoyance when invading his personal space. Even if he wasn't truly annoyed by it. In fact he liked it but he feared enjoying that contact._

What if letting her in held him back? 

_Maybe it was puberty or his childlike yearning to be close to someone that kept him from pushing her away each time like he should have. When he had been bitten by Orochimaru, he had known it was her hand that held his, that it was her heart beating wildly when she craddled him protectively to her chest as he had yelled in pain until being rendered unconscious and leaving her on her own..._

_Until_ this _had happened. Traces of her warmth of when she'd hugged him as madness had taken over him was still calming him as he studied her as if seeing her for the first time._

_She had made that madness and twisted power given to him by Orochimaru recede with that tight bittersweet feeling he didn't want to ever name. Her physical warmth when wrapping her arms around him and the salty scent of her tears as she had looked at him beseechingly, had made that darkness disappear as if scalded._

_Bonds. What were they really? He didn't want to know but in that moment, in that forest while seeing her with unevenly cut hair and tired green eyes, Sasuke finally admitted something to himself._

_That the color pink wasn't so bad after all_. 

 *****

_Sasuke-san?_

Whatever discomfort Sasuke felt at the formal way she was addressing him since they've seen each other face to face, was hidden yet it picked at him the handful of times she had said it since then. 

_"Thank you, Sasuke-san."_

_"Sorry for taking your clothes without permission, Sasuke-san..."_

Did she have any idea what she was  _doing_  to him by just using the suffix of 'san' and giving him a warm polite timid little smile that one would give to a stranger? 

He tried to not let it get to him too much. She wasn't at fault for her attitude towards him, it was all on him because he should have known that somehow this world they were in would cause some repercussions. 

Like her not remembering him, much less her saying she loved him in the past. He didn't doubt that Naruto and Kakashi and pretty much everyone else that had seen him at least once in their lives couldn't recall his name or who he was. 

It was as if he were invisible despite her acknowledging him with a smile and that damned " _Sasuke-san_ ". 

He ignored her pleased sigh beside him as they walked through the barely populated street in the Uchiha compound. The day was sunny again and of course she'd enjoy how pleasantly warm the air was and the fragrance of perpetual spring. 

The  _thing_  was oddly quiet inside of him but he was aware that it was watching Sakura. He couldn't seem to control his eyes when studying her from his peripheral vision while he walked in a slowed pace she could keep up with. 

 _It_  liked to observe her with a sadistic almost childish curiosity. 

Her old clothes had been disposed off soon after she was found. Her red top had been nothing but shredded bloodied rags that couldn't be fixed by simple needle and thread. The only things that had survived of her clothing was her sandals and shorts, along with her pouch with some supplies. 

She had fortunately understood and shyly had accepted a small grey shirt he had found among his belongings. He had made certain to get her one without his family crest though a deep part of him had toyed with the idea of intentionally giving her one with the uchiwa fan. 

He didn't understand were that selfish unexpected thought had come from. It was a curious mix of logic and old want for something he probably shouldn't ever wish having. 

He had  _wanted_  to see her wearing the symbol of his clan upon her back. 

Now with a very plain robe-like shirt wrapped on her properly for her size and her Konoha hitai-ite back on top of her head over more neatly tamed longish pink hair, Sakura looked relieved as he lead her to the front gates of the compound. 

She was perhaps wishing to get out of there quickly and Sasuke had no problems in seeing her off himself. 

 _Anything_  to get her out while there was still time and he kept the thing tamed. 

Seeing those opened gates showing a dark forest that was drastically different than the welcoming brightness of the walled-in compound, Sasuke felt too keenly how much distance he had put between himself and that world Sakura was soon going to return to. 

His  _old_  life was there. Konoha, team 7, and the truth of the death of his clan. Things that that didn't exist in the protectively walled world he was willingly leading Sakura away from.  

Sakura was a part of something that was not of the world he was now a part of and because of that she had to return and forget about him again. 

Just become a random stranger that had helped her once instead of the boy she had once loved and had gone to war for with Naruto to save him from the private hell of revenge. 

  _Its better this way._

 "Well, I guess this is it!" she sounded upbeat, forcedly so, when they finally reached the great opening to that old life he'd left behind. 

He didn't say anything and the fake brightness of her smile seemed to wither. 

 "Er, thank you again, Sasuke-san," his shoulders stiffened visibly as she bowed to him respectfully. 

Straightening her back, she had that forced polite smile again, a smile he was beginning to  _despise_ because it didn't suit her. He could tell she felt awkward around him and disliked seeing her obvious pretending. 

_Perhaps because I'm purposely trying to make it uncomfortable so she could leave._

 "Please... Please thank Mikoto-san for all as she's done and if you can," she began to wring her hands nervously, a habit he didn't know she had, "please tell her goodbye for me."

He stared coldly at her but nonetheless gave a single nod to her request. 

That was their parting. A _permanent_ one this time. He preferred it this way. In the past she had seen him depart a number of times but this time it was _her_  turn. A mirthless smirk almost lifted the corner of his lips at the irony of that.

Sakura was safe in not knowing who he was. She wouldn't cry at the loss of him nor have to wait for him to come back. It was merciful even if something he couldn't voice didn't want her to forget and walk through two towering opened doors that were awaiting her. 

Giving him one final smile, she turned towards the gates and moved forward. Showing him her back. That tightness in his chest he thought he'd forgotten as a child returned. 

Just as she came closer to the gates, close enough for her foot to touch the shadow of the forest outside, Sasuke's eyes widened at the sudden electric charge in the air. 

"Wait, Sakura!" he didn't know what it was but he needed to get her away from it. 

He was too late reaching her 

Sakura's whole body stiffened unnaturally as a scream tore from her throat. He could even smell the blood of her recently healed wounds reopening before it soaked the cloth on the back of the shirt he had recently given her. 

When he got to her, she slumped against him, her body shuddering as a look of terror had her green eyes widely staring unblinking up at him.

_What did she see?_

Shaking off that question he wrapped the one arm he had left around her and cringed inwardly at how her fresh blood stained his skin. 

_She's bleeding too much!_

This was one of those rare moments Sasuke allowed himself to show emotion. Sakura was hurt again and as he glared accusingly at those innocently open gates in front of them, she wasn't even being allowed to leave. 

That place had gotten a hold of her through the chakra that  _thing_  had put on her back. 

Clenching his jaw, he inwardly cursed not being able to properly take her back to his house to tend to the newly opened claw marks on her back. He'd grown accustomed to doing many things with just one arm, but he couldn't carry Sakura comfortably while her body convulsed with the dark chakra current punishing her for trying to leave. 

_I need to get her away from this gate._

He held her weight with his one arm, and pulled her tightly to his side to make her walk on her shaky legs. Sakura, though unable to stop panting with tears running down her face, gripped the front of his shirt and forced her legs to cooperate with him, already guessing what he was about to do. 

Their pace was slow but they managed to little by little leave the gate doors behind them and soon enough he felt Sakura's shuddering lessen though her legs were still too weak for her to walk on her own. 

  _Damn it!_ , he was glad she was too busy trying to walk shakily with his support that she couldn't closely look at his face. He was certain he was scowling venomously at nothing in particular, just _thinking_  about how things now were. 

Focusing on just getting her back to his house, he had almost missed an oppressive weight that seemed to follow their slow gait. It was so intense, the coldness behind it made him pause despite him needing to move quickly to tend to Sakura. 

Confused by it, he looked at were it was originating it from. 

Some of his clan had gone outside to the once almost empty street to see what had happened. Normally he wouldn't have been surprised because hearing Sakura's piercing pained shriek would bring anyone outside of their homes to investigate. 

But it wasn't that which carried that burning weight. 

Their eyes. Eyes like glossy, cold obsidian seemed to be  _glaring_  from their expressionless faces. 

It was a look of hatred. Icy and poisonous. The kind that stunned and made a body freeze mid-step. Pure accusatory hatred that they were obviously directly aiming at a pained and unaware Sakura he held to his side. 

So many eyes, as if controlled by a single entity, just _stared_ at her with a barely concealed angered intent that bordered on a familiar insanity he had grown used to from that  _thing_  inside of him.  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry I had to delete the chapter cos if a very dumb screw up!,( ; _ ; )
> 
> Remember to leave a kudos and/or review if you liked! Also if you want to see something brought up in the storyline you can say it. (Someone in my tumblr chat is curious about what Naruto is up to this whole time so he might be coming up soon too)
> 
> PS: someone asked me about the timeline of the story and being confused since Sakura is eighteen and Sasuke hadn't appeared until The Last only briefly when they were still teens aka nineteen. 
> 
> Let me just confess something people could have guessed already. I don't ship NH and the events of The Last or that timeline don't exist here. I'm not trying to be rude or anything but I just... Ship Naruto with other characters... Besides that I can choose what is or isn't in my fic. Don't expect any of that here. I won't bash the pairing or Hinata in my fic tho since her character and the pairing are irrelevant to the plot. Tho the plot mainly concentrates on SS, it'll also brings up Sasuke's bonds to the rest of his team and Hinata isn't a part of that so er... That's all. I'll shut up before I run my mouth too much.


	8. Blood

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Some healing, brotherly awkwardness and some "wtf is Sasuke doing behind Sakura's back?"

An icy current. That was what Sakura had assaulting her entire body. A coldness that entered her veins, her mind and froze her momentarily until all she could vaguely feel was someone holding her close to them and making her move one foot in front of the other. 

 _Sasuke-san_. 

Her mind was fogged by the icy sensation, yet she knew it was  _him_  slowly taking away her from the gate. He didn't speak but she felt reassured somehow by his quiet strong presence. 

It was all so strange to her. She hadn't seen what it was that entered her body. It had suddenly attacked her like a invisible force as soon as her foot was a fraction of an inch outside of the gates. For a brief moment she had seen nothing but darkness and heard a piercing scream that made her ears sting and now she was certain that scream had left her own lips. 

Sasuke tensed but her concentration was focused on regaining the sensation of blood flow back to her legs, rather than on him. Her legs felt heavy and almost rubbery in movements. If it hadn't been for him holding her up, she would had been pitifully dragging herself on the ground. 

_What would have happened if I had managed to walk out?_

Just for trying to walk out her whole body felt as if she had _died_ for a moment. 

Shuddering strongly, her cheeks heated as her mind vaguely noticed she was literally pawing the front of Sasuke's shirt in desperation. His lack of complaint on it only further embarrassed her. She couldn't help it and yet she was _clinging_ to a stranger that she could tell clearly didn't want her around and had still been very cooperative in escorting her out of secret village.

_Did he know that doing this would put me out of commission?_

Distrust could be a lifesaver and an ugly thing at the same time. Somewhere in her subconscious, she trusted Sasuke. She didn't know  _why_  she felt comforted while barely knowing him and only seeing his impassivity towards her, but  _something_  had her let down her guard. 

The only thing that truly made Sakura uncomfortable around him was not knowing him or _what_ was going on in that place. She hated being in the dark and when she had walked in the streets prior to the 'gate incident' earlier, she had sensed something was wrong in the air but had ignored it in her eagerness to leave. 

The forest outside of the hidden village, had been rainy and cloudy. A heavy contrast to the warmth and sunshine within the great walls. The difference between bleak darkness and unusual brightness without a cloud in the sky above her should had been a warning. 

_Something is not right here._

Her pain lessened the more they moved forward and she was slowly regaining her ability to sense things other than her pain. Sasuke's increasing pace and the tightening of his arm around her waist to hold her trembling body closer was among those things she became aware of. It was like he was hurrying more to their destination. 

Despite her regaining some of her senses she could barely focus on anything visually. Her bangs had fallen over her eyes and all she could see was pink with the almost offensive cheery sunlight brightening it. 

Soon, Sasuke's odd behavior ceased when he stopped and relaxed some of the stiffness of his body. She could feel his arm loosening and for a moment she grew alarmed that he was going to drop her. Her hand grasping the front of his shirt unknowingly twisted the cloth further in her apprehension. 

As if reading her thoughts, he explained factually, his quiet voice ruffling the hair on the top of her head, "I'll just have to set you down for a moment to-"

The sound of a quickly sliding door interrupted his words. Sakura didn't have to be told she had been taken back to his house. They must have been standing on the front step of the open wooden porch she remembered seeing when they had left.

"What happened?" another male voice, deeper and more smoother than Sasuke's, asked and she couldn't help stiffening not knowing this new person speaking from the now open doorway. He sounded unaffected yet there was a small hint of curious concern in his question and she could feel his eyes looking her over as he remained hidden from her sight due to her hair. 

Sasuke's arm tightened around her again, confusing her. 

"The front gate. She couldn't pass it," that was all Sasuke said and she could feel him pulling her forward with him again. Sakura was surprised they managed to make it back to his house without falling into a tangle of limbs on the street. He had been doing most of the walking and practically  _half carrying_  her while her legs had trembled with effort. 

_Another thing to thank him for..._

"I'll go get mother," the other male voice said softly once the sunlight dimmed, telling Sakura they were finally in the entry room of the house. 

_So this is his brother. Mikoto-san said his name is Itachi._

"Its fine. I tended to her the first time," Sakura didn't know what their family issues were but she could tell that Sasuke didn't trust the other man.

_Or anyone. It could be much easier if his mother-_

"Sasuke, mother almost had a heart attack the first time-"

"I said I'll do it," Sasuke's tone left no room for argument. 

 _What's his problem?!,_  if she had been able to form words, she would have said something about his attitude. No wonder Mikoto was so concerned about her youngest son.  

Not being able to voice her saying 'no' to him tending to her she had to go through the humiliation of having this boy set her down on the step of the entry room to take off her shoes. 

 _I'll never live this down. Seriously, this is too much_., she felt an almost childish need to cry having him doing something so mundane for her. It was something she expected of her family member or her  _husband_  that she didn't even have yet. 

There was nothing intimate with his demeanor during his actions at all. Just going through the motions of taking off her shoes without a word as even more embarrassingly, Itachi  _witnessed_  her being treated like a child while she slumped in a defeated sitting position on that step. 

_He wants to do everything himself._

She was already suspicious of these people yet Sasuke's behavior didn't do anything to quell her dread about the place. In fact he  _reinforced_  them. She didn't know if he or his family could be trusted. 

Hearing a sigh from Itachi that had been quietly watching her shameful moments, she hung her head further down, hoping her blush would be confused as the redness of pain. 

"Since you're being stubborn again, I guess I'll bring the medkit and some new clothes," Sasuke didn't respond to the other man that eventually quietly departed, leaving them alone. Finally freeing her left foot out of its sandaled boot that had buckles to the side, his pale slightly bloodied fingers barely touched her skin. 

_He's been doing all this with one hand..._

The medic in her was curious about that. If she could have spoken she would have asked why he put himself through so much work for her with just one arm. Getting assistance from Mikoto or Itachi would have saved him the trouble. She actually didn't like the thought of him doing all of this with some limitations because he clearly struggled to even bring her to the house. 

_Damn it, I need to apologize and thank him a hundred times over._

"Done," her thoughts were cut off and she soon felt that one arm gently reach for her to help her up. With the pain being considerably less pronounced and thought consuming, Sakura had to face the fact that this guy had no issue holding her pressed to him, or taking her sandals off, or...

 _Crap!,_  he lifted her up easily to his side and she felt like her whole entire body was on fire. The rush of blood to the top of her skin, giving her the hue of embarrassment made the numbing of her body even more painful. It downright  _stung_  to be held close to him and becoming too aware that his one arm was rather muscular and that his body was lean yet hard, proving he perhaps trained regularly. 

 _I shouldn't be even thinking this!,_  cursing her body's reaction to how he felt within close contact, she closed her eyes tightly and tuned him out. She just completely forced herself to keep her mind blank and not think of how hard his shoulder was under her head, or the clear muscle definition he had under his loose black shirt that had fooled her into thinking he was thinner when first seeing him.  

Even his gentle unhurried breathing was somewhat distracting. He was completely unaffected and Sakura felt childish for what she was thinking. 

_If Ino were here she'd never let me live this down. Me getting excited when in pain. Just perfect. I must have a thing for this._

She was surprised he didn't bring her upstairs yet she wasn't going to question it. He took her to a room close to the kitchen, that was as far as she knew. 

Although it was silly, she was proud of the fact that her face was no longer too hot with mortification at her previous train of thoughts about Sasuke. He seemed like an observant sort and he would probably figure out something was bothering her with having her body plastered to his. 

Relief was a gift when she was gently settled down on the floor on some cushioning. Opening her eyes, she saw her bare knees were pressed on a dark blue futon. He finally wasn't touching her and the sensation of uncomfortable heat passing all over her skin ebbed. 

"Can you move your hands?" His voice was close and right behind her and although her hands were trembling slightly, she gave a slow shaky nod. She was glad she couldn't see his cold pretty face. 

"Then you'll need to take the shirt off. The shirt was clean but your wounds can it still get infected with the cloth on them," Sakura's eyebrows rose in shock. 

Now she was  _really_  alert to her surroundings. 

And _pissed_ off. 

_I'm not taking my shirt off in front of this guy! Just who does he think he is?! Just because he's attractive and helping me doesn't mean he can just-!_

"Sakura...," her body trembled in frustration as he spoke to her like she was a small child, "you're a medic. You  _know_  you shouldn't argue about this."

 _How did he...? Did I_ tell _anyone here I was a medic?_

Stiffening, she stubbornly didn't make any move to unwrap the kimono-like shirt from her torso. 

Just like his brother earlier, Sasuke gave a low sigh of frustration with her. 

"I'll take it off myself if you don't," his voice was cold but she knew by the hint of sharpness to it that he was absolutely serious. 

He  _might_  have cut off her shirt the first night she was brought in. He  _might_  have seen her bare back already, but this was the  _first_  time she ever took her clothes off in front of a man. 

"Turn...," her voice croaked, "around."

Silence met her words yet she finally heard him shifting somewhere behind her. At least he was considerate enough to listen to her about turning around. She knew that she was probably making an unnecessary big fuss out of it, yet it would have been too intimate to have him see her peel the bloodied shirt off. 

 _It hurts like a bitch!,_  she shivered beginning to do just that. The blood had definitely been drying and crusting into the cloth. Her fingers fumbled yet she managed to take it off, as well as the binding on her breasts that she noted with a wince, was covered in her blood. Paling at the sight of it, she pulled the stained garments to her chest to cover herself even though all Sasuke could see was her wounded back. 

"Finished...," she hated the sound of her voice then. She sounded like a frightened little kid that it was no wonder he had talked to her like she was one.

As if waiting for that moment there was a knock and she could hear Sasuke standing up to slide the door to the room open. 

A soft 'here' came from his brother outside of the room and she could hear Sasuke ask lowly, "Where are they?"

"Who?"

"Mother and father."

"Father is getting the clan together for the meeting for tonight and mother is with him."

Sakura felt awkward overhearing something that clearly had nothing to do with her.

"I'm going tonight."

"You are?" Itachi's voice was obviously surprised. She was surprised herself because this other man seemed more composed than Sasuke himself. 

"Yeah...," Sasuke's answer seemed to have pleased his brother because his once somber tone changed. 

"Then I'll tell the others."

She could barely hear the rest, but finally the door gently slid closed and she was alone once again with Sasuke. Not having any idea of the importance of the meeting, she didn't force herself to speak like before. 

Whatever these clan meetings were, happened to be something he rarely participated in. Or at least that was the impression she got. 

_And what's the deal with his brother? He goes from frosty cold to suddenly being-_

Like before, as if warning her off from over thinking, her inner questions were interrupted when the medkit that had being brought in was put beside her on the futon and it's lid was opened. 

_Ask him about Naruto and Kakashi-sensei!_

"My... Team...," it was a struggle to say the words and the ensuing silence behind her was killing her. All she could hear was him uncapping a bottle of what she suspected was antiseptic judging by it's smell. 

Finally he spoke, "We haven't found them," her heart sunk in disbelief. 

_I know the forest is huge but they couldn't have just simply disappeared like that!_

"Wha-what?" her voice stuttered out when she felt a tentative touch of something cool on her back that burned slightly. He was carefully cleaning off her blood. Just dabbing lightly at the red opened skin. 

"We found a campsite but not them...," his words trailed off as if he were deep in his own thoughts.

_Oh kami! The creature from that night! Could it have...?!_

"I don't think anything bad has happened to them," his words were flat and as if stating a fact he knew for certain. It would have been comforting if he had any  _more_  information to give her. 

He didn't speak further and she didn't expect him to. As little as she knew of him, it was already apparent that he only talked when he had something to say and at the moment he clearly had nothing else to add on. 

Thinking of her team left her quiet as well, so she couldn't hold his silence against him. He didn't speak and only paid attention to her back. Even her thoughts of him kneeling behind her closely while she barely covered her breasts with bloodied clothes didn't bother her as it used to. Perhaps it was because of how unaffected he was by her bare skin. 

She almost felt stung by it. It wasn't the sting of antiseptic making her newly bleeding scars smart in pain, but the sting of how  _cold_  he was. 

The guy had her half naked and alone and he was as nonchalant as if he was putting a bandaid on a scraped knee. She supposed that could be considered a _good_ thing despite her previous anger and embarrassment. 

Because of his evident indifference and the lack of sounds, her thoughts easily returned back her missing team. She allowed herself to relax under his ministrations although said ministrations made her cuts burn with disinfectant. 

What could have happened? If a campsite was found, that meant they hadn't returned at all. Kakashi-sensei, although lax on some things like  _punctuality_ , always made certain their campsites left  _no_ traces when they moved on. 

 _They haven't gotten back to it. They could_ still be  _out there._

Or they could have been unable to get back to the camp and left altogether to gather reinforcements. In all the ways Sakura looked at the situation, she could only conclude that something was wrong and that her team could be in danger. 

She wanted to ask more though she doubted Sasuke would give her all the answers she wanted. 

"The cuts on the back of your neck..."

"What...?" that seemed like an odd thing to break the silence. 

"They're deeper... That thing was seriously trying to kill you," that revelation had her blood run cold. Sasuke became quiet again as he lightly cleaned those wounds he mentioned. She hissed in a breath because they hurt more that all the rest. 

Yet it  _hadn't_  killed her... It had clawed her and pushed her down kami knew how many feet but it hadn't lingered to finish its job as if it had _reconsidered_ finishing her off at the last moment. 

_Why did my scars bleed again when I was to trying to leave...?_

Something warm, like a gentle breeze, teased the bloodied back of her neck and Sakura gasped softly yet found it impossible to move because she thought she had imagined the  _breath_  on her skin and the growing heat behind her. It was as if Sasuke had silently inched closer to her and was so close he could almost  _touch_  her back with his chest.

The warmth on her back was the warmth only another body could bring. She could practically feel both his somewhat comforting warmth and his soft breathing on her skin. 

The moist heat that subtly dragged over one of her bleeding wounds and had her face blanching at the contact, was what snapped her out of her stillness. The tell-tale wetness had her breath halt in her throat at the _shock_ of it. 

That  _no longer_  felt like the cold dampened cotton he'd been using on her. 

About to go off, shredded voice be damned, she whipped her head to the side to tell him to get what she suspected was his _tongue_  away from her and was only confronted by his impassive face at a proper distance from her and his one hand pulling away with a bloodied cotton ball. 

Guilt nearly slammed into her. She truly thought this guy was being perverted with her when he was just  _so fucking calm_  about everything. It was like a punch to her ego that made her wish he had  _tried_  something so she'd go off at him. Then at least her anger would have been justified. 

_That damned paranoia setting in._

She hated how her thoughts were affecting her negatively. 

Seeing Sasuke looking at her in mild askance she heard herself mumble, "Thanks."

He just gave a nod to her word of gratitude. She was thankful that he didn't mention the brief fulminating glare she had shot at him seconds prior. 

"I was finishing anyway. They don't look as bad as the last time. They look more like some scratches now," one of her eyebrows rose at finally hearing him speak so many words. 

"Oh," mentally kicking herself for how awkward it was between them again, that was her only intelligible response. 

_At least I don't have a fever and the scars don't feel as wet with blood as before..._

"There's a new shirt beside you," when she looked to where he meant since she hadn't noticed it before, she barely heard him stand up to leave.

She felt like a broken record saying the word 'thanks' a couple of times already in the same day but there was really nothing else she could say to him. 

Absentmindedly grabbing the neatly rolled up shirt, she turned around only slightly to say yet another annoying 'thanks' to him but he was already gone from the room and the door was closed. 

_He's so quiet I didn't even hear him open and close the door._

Puzzled by it, she eyed the black shirt given to her and unfolded it only to pale with her eyes widening. 

The uchiwa fan she had avoided earlier that day was on its back. It stood out starkly with its red and white colors on the black background of the cloth.

It seemed to mock her in a way as if telling her that since she couldn't leave she might as well be one of them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for how long Sasuke and Sakura took in this. Please keep in mind that Sakura feels he's like a stranger because she's forgotten everything about him. If she DID remember him she'd be freaking out about everything he's doing even more. 
> 
> About Itachi's and Sasuke's coldness when interacting, that will be touched on later tho earlier chapters had hinted that Itachi was concerned and kinda getting on Sasuke's case about it.
> 
> Don't worry, he's being a good bro. 
> 
> And tbh Sasuke was already on edge from the end of chapter seven. Seeing his clan acting like that wasn't going to happily have him Sakura over to them. He decided to do everything himself even tho he's still learning to use just one arm.
> 
> He has no problem taking care of himself with it, but yes taking care of other people like in Sakura's emergency.
> 
> PS: when I mention "futon" in this fic I actually mean a traditional Japanese futon that is on the floor and can be rolled up. Not a sofa bed which is the western version of the futon. Someone got confused XD.


	9. Red

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sasuke has his issues and we finally get to see what happened to Naruto. Warnings for bones literally breaking.

It took a lot of effort for Sasuke to not flee in full speed like the last time he had felt it. Just to keep some of his pride intact, he left Sakura with a false calmess and quietness while she had been too distracted to keep her from seeing what he was certain was a terrifying look on his face. 

The hunger for violence had almost taken over. Being alone with her while smelling her blood running down her bare back as she had shivered so vulnerable and exposed to his eyes, had taken a toll on him. 

He hadn't known what to do. After what he had seen in the street outside he'd become wary of his clan, including Itachi, who he strangely sensed no animosity coming from. The instant distrust he had felt upon witnessing his clan's odd behavior had been what pushed him to make a rash decision.

To tend to Sakura himself even if it cost him. 

Now he was paying for what he had stupidly thought was a _better_ option.

The last thing he had been expecting was to be so strongly affected by Sakura when alone and seeing her naked bleeding skin so temptingly close. 

He had _tried_ to control it. Kept his face blank and had ignored what he was doing to the point that he was just cleaning random places with the stained cotton ball instead of the actual lacerations on her skin. But he couldn't stop being _intoxicated_ by the smell of her blood. 

While Sakura had been unaware, he had been aroused behind her with his nostrils slightly flaring as he attempted and _failed_ to keep his breathing even and calm. His heart had been pounding so wildly he could practically hear the blood flow in his ears. 

The only thing that gave him some shred of sanity was that his vision didn't go completely black like in his room the first time the creature had been aroused by her. By seeing Sakura's back with its feminine delicate arch and her longish pink hair swept to the side to give him better access to the long scars that descended from the back of her neck, it had been easy to remind himself that this was _Sakura_. 

Sakura... His old teammate, the girl who confessed to him, the girl who fought alongside Naruto to end his madness and the girl who was _his_ , not the creature's. 

It made him sick to his stomach that he could almost not tell himself apart from the _thing_ desperate to taste her flesh. He felt the creature's possessiveness and it mingled with his own desire to keep Sakura away from it. In a way they were _both_ possessive but in different forms. 

To this day he didn't know what he truly felt for Sakura. It was definitely something different to other girls that had fawned over him. There was a sweetness and a closeness that he hadn't ever taken the time to define out of some fear he still had lingering behind from earlier years. 

The tightness of his chest he'd felt as a child regarding her was still there and he hadn't felt that for anyone else. After the darkness within him had left for that time he was in Konoha after the final battle, he had decided he was going to give himself a chance to explore it even though a part of him feared the idea of feeling _too_ much. Of succumbing to what he had been running away from and had thought would make him too weak to get his revenge. 

What is this feeling called love anymore? Affection? When Sakura had first told him she loved him he had been a child who had decided on a bleak future in which he could potentially die to fulfill. That was partly what kept him from ever exploring how he truly felt about her loving him or to think too _deeply_ about the times he hadn't put the distance he should have and allowed himself to feel her close. 

Perhaps what he felt towards her was a greedy form of hope that he closed himself off to quickly once he decided to go off on his own. To get stronger, he didn't _need_ what she was giving him or offering for his future. He didn't _need_ to desire or hope for those things coming from anyone, _including_ her. 

Yet when he had left her at the gates of Konoha when it was all finally over, he had allowed himself to _hope_. He _told_ himself he'd come back to her after he felt worthy and less confused. After so many years of darkness, his vision had been so blissfully clear and he had _hope_ that he could repay Sakura's love, even if he feared the emotion. 

He had seen her as the only one for that. 

Sadly somewhere in his journey, his mind had become cloudier than as it was back then. In that very moment, he couldn't even _think_ about that once pure feeling again. Not with creature inside of him panting with need after getting a taste of Sakura's blood in just a small split second of him losing hold of it. 

In just that _one_ second, the thing in it's vile perversity had made Sasuke's own trembling body crouch closely behind Sakura's back to lick her blood and feel a vulgar hellish sort of bliss. It was a pleasure not that dissimilar from the one Sasuke received when he felt forced to stroke himself to completion alone in the bathroom, though this pleasure was twisted until unnatural. 

Recalling how that one single lick had made his taste buds literally ache and how the seconds had seemed to have stretched on forever, Sasuke was still surprised he had been able to pull away in the first place. Years of purposely hiding his intentions was what helped him keep a normal expressionless mask when Sakura had turned her head to the side to give him an accusing glare. 

Luckily she had only looked at his face and didn't turn her body more towards him to see exactly what state he was in. If she had truly _tried_ to study him, she would have seen the growing bulge in his pants and the betraying tremble of his retreating hand. 

She would have _known_ he had gotten a taste of her and that something evil was desperate to get out. 

Now after that incident, he got to the bathroom, which was quickly becoming the place to hide his sins and angrily spat into the sink close to the doorway . Seeing the blood and saliva on the whiteness of the sink as he panted gave him some small sense of relief. 

He wasn't going to 'take care' of his problem again. She was in the room next to the bathroom and she'd hear him muffling the needy groans that he was still ashamed of. He was almost _certain_ she'd know. 

Quietly closing the door, he rested his back against it but didn't stop looking at what he had spit out. He wasn't going to lose his focus of how _symbolic_ it was. His breath, which once had been falsely calm, was coming out in quick breaths as if he had run there instead of walked. His chest ached with exertion but keeping his gaze on what he had rejected from his mouth soothed a part of his mind. 

He _wasn't_ a monster. He could tell it was wrong and he _wasn't_ going to feed it what it felt it needed. 

The creature's puzzlement within him had an angry edge. It was _furious_ but Sasuke kept his thoughts focused on _him_ being the one in control. If he had _truly_ been a monster he would have swallowed that taste of blood and would have been pleasuring himself like before. 

His erection felt tight and overly sensitive but he ignored it as his breathing slowed. He had already taken care of _that_ problem earlier that day and had no intention of doing it again after what just happened. 

_Sakura is frightened and confused. She doesn't even trust me._

Sasuke didn't know what to think of that. Her memories of him were gone and yet he was angered and somehow relieved by it. He knew that there were _some_ things he wished she'd forget... However he felt somewhat irritated by the fact that she'd forgotten that she told him she loved him. That she now called him "Sasuke-san" and looked at him suspiciously and detached. 

What frustrated him most of all was _why_ it hurt him that she'd forgotten. It _should_ have made their lives easier. She could live a normal life and find someone else to love without him in her memories as he remained tied to the 'clan'. But the idea of her living her life without loving him just _irritated_ him. 

Perhaps he was selfish after all and hadn't even known it. He couldn't call what he had felt growing for her, what he had to tried to _erase_ from his mind, the word _love_ , and yet he was _greedy_ for her to feel that for him. 

And that childish greed disgusted as well as confused him. Sakura wasn't his possession. She was her own person and he shouldn't feel he _owned_ any part of her. 

Even though her love had been his. _That_ was what kept coming up in his thoughts. Her _love_ had been given to him and it had been destroyed by his own desire to have the life that had been taken from him. The few things he had before leaving Konoha in his journey was Sakura's love and Naruto's friendship and brotherly bond. 

He had _lost_ , no more like _sacrificed_ those things, to regain something that had been deformed like some sickening parody. He didn't even know if this was his revived clan or monsters, exactly like the one housed inside of him, _faking_ to be his clan and feeding off his memories of them before the massacre.  

 _This_ thing _is twisting my thoughts again._

Closing his eyes, he allowed his body to relax. His lower belly was hurting uncomfortably. Perhaps it was hunger or him being so tense before, but at least he had stopped that creature's own hunger for Sakura once again. 

*****

_Naruto didn't know if he was asleep or awake anymore. All he could see was one color and nothing else._

_Red._

_Something that was blood red with an eerie dull glow that Naruto couldn't look away from as he heard something ominously cracking as if from a distance was what always greeted him in these half-awake dreams._

Are those twigs being stepped on?

_He didn't feel anything as those cracking sounds continued. His stare was glued to that swirling red but it wasn't that redness that held him prisoner under an invisible heavy weight. At first he would have thought he was hypnotized by its seemingly eternal spinning, but it wasn't that at all._

I can't feel my body.

**_Crack!_ **

_The crimson staring down into his wide frightened eyes was angry. Naruto could almost hear voices by just looking into that hateful glow. A canticle of abhorrent voices that spit out hurtful words. Male and female, that_ fused _together to speak in unison._

**_Useless, dead last, idiot, loser... Go away! Go away! Why are you still coming after me?! Go away, Naruto!_ **

_The words were cruel and Naruto was stunned by the old pain they brought to him. He knew this kind of mental pain. It was something he had grown with all his life but now there was an_ intimacy _behind them that had him staring into that redness in a state of cold shock._

_The redness recognized him and he recognized it in return. It was an old friend he didn't remember having..._

_**That child... He's trouble. Stay away from him**. _

_He couldn't shiver under the weight he had on his chest that held him still as the now very sickening pops of what he suspected were_ bones _being snapped, echoed with that endless flow of words._

Blood. I smell so much blood...

_He was reliving a moment. It was a nightmare he couldn't look away from because it confused him._

This is a memory of that night! There were so many of them talking at the same time! The night that thing...

 _"If it hadn't been for the kyuubi he would have been dead. It took us longer to find him than Hatake. Kid is pretty lucky...," an unknown voice seemed to break through the barrage of insults he was receiving from the redness he couldn't stop staring at because of how_ familiar _it was._

**_You are nothing!_ **

_"Whatever did this to him and Hatake, shattered both their arms and legs without hitting any vital points..."_

My arms and legs...?

_"So they weren't really trying to kill them but immobilize them..."_

What?

_"Could be... They seemed to have struck certain areas of the body to make them completely immobile while they did this-"_

_"You mean like a Hyuga technique?"_

_Naruto concentrated on those voices to shut out the cruel words that seemed to have permanently entered his mind to stay. He couldn't block the sadistic voices out or those disgusting popping noises even by trying to force himself awake._

**_Snap!_ **

_"Not quite, but it used a method to paralyze them. We still haven't gotten any clear lab test results to see if they injected a drug in those specific areas. They keep coming back as inconclusive but I can't help feeling that some kind of foreign toxin was used. Both him and Hatake could have been injected at the..."_

Why are they only talking about me and Kakashi-sensei?, _Naruto's stomach twisted at how they didn't_ once _mention Sakura._

_"Looks like more than one person did this..."_

_"What makes you think it was more than one or even people? It takes a lot of strength to twist bones until they..."_

**_Snap! Crack!_ **

_The sounds were becoming so disgustingly wet now. Naruto's breath sped up in a panic._

Those are my bones!, _his heart pounded at the realization._

 _He_ _had thought it was splintering wood when in fact it had been his_ bones _being painlessly twisted until breaking. He hadn't felt it at all but he_ heard _them being broken._

 _"His legs and arms were broken too fast. Who did that to him not only had extraordinary strength but the power to paralyze him long enough to do it before the kyuubi could throw them off. This was done in a matter of seconds. It couldn't have been just_ one _person. Where's that report?"_

**_You're never be anything! Just look at you! You think you can be a ninja?! A_ hokage _?! You're pathetic!_**

_"At least he's healing fast after that fever... Hatake might take awhile. With so many operations..."_

_"Any word on Haruno?"_

Sakura-chan! Where is she?! Did it get her too?

**_Stay... Don't leave her here. It's too danger-Go away! Stay away! Sakura's_ dead _!_**

_Naruto pushed away the memory of those words and tried to painstakingly open his eyes._

_"None... Its been two weeks since we've found these two. We might be too late."_

Finally opening his eyes to see the blinding whiteness of the hospital room, Naruto felt only agony as his breath desperately gasped out the name of his teammate.

"Sa-Sakura..."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry but... I almost killed Naruto (ノಠ益ಠ)ノ彡┻━┻ I didn't meant to but there HAD to be a reason he didn't come. 
> 
> Plus, I wanted to give a little more info on what's going on in that creepy forest. 
> 
> PS: no, Naruto wasn't paralyzed by the sharingan. Those creatures are literally poisonous. Sakura was infected by that poison in the first chapter. It fucks up your chakra and takes away your physical strength. The only thing that kept Naruto alive despite bleeding nearly to death with all his limbs about to be ripped off was Kurama that had been affected to some degree himself. We don't know exactly what kind of creatures are these, but you really might want to watch out for that poison. Its designed to do different things to a person, but its main use is to weaken strength and chakra. There's actually no immunity to it (except maybe avoid being getting a good dose of it and from what you can see from Naruto's recollections, he practically had a crowd on him so he probably had a near lethal amount to keep him down)
> 
> Please leave a kudos and/or review if you liked!


	10. Closeness

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Omg you guys I'm so sorry. I made Sasuke creepy instead of sexy. Sweet Jesus. It just turned out that way after rereading my work. (ノಠ益ಠ)ノ彡┻━┻
> 
> There's some pre-massacre Uchihas (Itachi to be more precise), if that's any consolation. (;Д;)
> 
> There's nothing tooooo bad... Just some squeezing and pressing Sakura against the wall and Sasu-wang popping up to say 'hi'. (;o;)

Dinner was an awkward affair later that night for Sasuke. Now instead of four at the table there were five. His 'family' now included Sakura who looked worn from what had happened to her earlier. 

_She hasn't gotten her chakra back..._

He shouldn't wonder why she wouldn't tell him. To her he was practically _no one_ , yet the thought that she had been thinking of going off on her own without fully recovered chakra bothered him. He hadn't realized it until she had joined them for dinner and he'd noted something unexpected... She didn't even have enough to _heal_ herself from the newly opened scars, though she acted normally enough as if not bothered by the pain. 

He discreetly watched her as she spoke politely to his 'mother'. To a casual observer, he would look more interested with his food yet he was still very aware of her every move. The creature inside of him paid a ridiculous amount of attention to every tiny detail regarding her, including how many times she brought her chopsticks to her lips and the rare split seconds she hid a wince of discomfort from her back possibly aching. 

"Its the first time we've heard of anything like that happening. We could send a message to your village to let them know you're here while it's investigated," his 'father's' tone was distant, informative, the same tone he used to give orders, despite him offering her assistance. 

"I'm sure it'll be fine, Fugaku-san. I'll figure a way past it-"

"Its too dangerous to go out in those woods without chakra, Sakura," Sasuke's chopsticks dropped clumsily on the table when Itachi suddenly said those words. 

 _Of all the odd things to mention._ , He looked at his 'brother' beside him in surprise for casually bringing that up as if he had known all along. 

"How would _you_ know she doesn't have any?" the question left his lips almost accusingly and Itachi stared back at him mildly, apparently unsurprised by his tone. 

Itachi's annoyingly unhurried response and slight smile filled Sasuke with a helpless sense of dread. 

"She told me when I went to go check on her after you left her in the guest bedroom."

 _Why would she tell him this...? She barely even spoke to me when we were alone so why would she give this information to_ Itachi _who she has just met today...?_

The answer should have been obvious to him. It was like a punch to his stomach. 

Sakura _didn't trust_ him. 

Sasuke tried to keep himself calm. He had to remind himself that Sakura didn't know about what was truly happening around her and while she had no access to her chakra and couldn't leave, she'd have to depend on _them_ to some extent. He hadn't even sensed his brother go visit Sakura while in the house. He had let down his guard too much thinking Itachi wouldn't be bold enough to approach Sakura himself in the guest bedroom. 

_I guess there's still things I don't know about him... Or he simply isn't Itachi..._

The thought itself made his stomach twist discomfortingly, making him quickly lose his appetite, not like he had much of an appetite to begin with when he had come to the dinner table. Picking up his chopsticks again to at least _appear_ unaffected, he forced himself to let the matter drop. 

"Itachi-san was only checking if I needed some help with finding herbs  for my back and...," he couldn't control the frosty look he sent her way across from him that stopped her flow of words. The creature was giving nasty little clawing pain inside of him just _hearing_ her talk. 

Their eyes met and held. He could only see her green eyes, so still and yet so puzzled at the glare he'd given her. 

"You don't need to be so formal, just call me Itachi," he didn't know if he should feel relief the moment Sakura broke the uncomfortable eye contact when his brother finally spoke, as if he was trying to subtly ease the unease Sasuke's unwarranted glare could had given their 'guest'.

 _Or prisoner_.

"Well... Alright then... Itachi," her voice was grating on his last nerves. He looked down at his food without making any moves to actually _eat_ it. His only relief was that everyone was more focused on Sakura than on his obvious struggle to hold himself in place and trying to not snap his chopsticks in his right hand with how tense he'd become.

Grinding his teeth to remain silent he _knew_ what was wrong. The creature was feeling _possessive_ and easily irritable. These weren't even _his_ own emotions. While Sasuke's conscious mind was more concerned with her being alone with _anyone_ in his 'family', the creature felt _robbed_ of it's prey. It didn't want _anyone_ from his clan alone with her. 

To it, Sakura was a meal it had marked for itself and in that moment it saw Itachi as a threat. 

 _Damn_ _it. Shut up!,_ in spite of clenching his jaw, he could almost hear a low almost purring growl that he feared Sakura, of all people, would hear.

She was the _last_ person he'd want to know about the thing plaguing him so much that he couldn't even trust himself around her for too long. He had literally _licked_ her earlier that day because he'd lost control only briefly. 

"Sasuke, you've barely touched your food...," his mother pointed out, her concern so evident that he felt guilt for how coldly he'd been acting towards her even though he didn't trust _her_ or _anyone_ else in the compound. 

"I'm not that hungry," he murmured without looking at her and he heard his father make an exasperated sound under his breath. 

"You need to stop doing this-"

"Fugako, we have a _guest_ ," his mother was always one for manners. A perfect wife, mother, an _Uchiha_. Although she rarely spoke up to his father at all because there rarely was a need to, there were times she would not keep silent.

This was one of those times she let her anger show through her soft spoken mask. 

"I want to talk to you after dinner," Fugaku said before continuing to quietly eat, unwilling to completely let the uncomfortable subject go, and Sasuke felt like it was more of a _threat_ than an invite to a father-son conversation. 

_We've got the 'meeting' after this._

He couldn't stop himself from wondering if this is what his life would have truly been like had his family truly lived. 

His 'father' was treating him like some _rebellious teenager_ for crying out loud. Under different circumstances, he probably would have felt some embarrassment yet all he could feel was anger at seeing his family being acted out by what he suspected were monsters. 

_Why did I choose this?_

The conversation changed to another subject while he was still unable to eat a single bite. His stomach was so tight with tension over the current situation that even _thinking_ of bringing food to his mouth made him nauseated. 

Not paying attention to what was being said, the voices of his family seemed to fade away as he concentrated on keeping his breathing calm, to keep _it_ from appearing. His usually quiet family was welcoming and more talkative with a guest. Well, his mother and brother were. The only ones that kept the 'tradition' of remaining mostly quiet was him and his father. 

"-maybe Sakura can check him," Itachi's comment had Sasuke looking at him with clear disbelief. He couldn't even hide his dumbfounded expression, completely lost on how their once distant mumbling focused on _him_ again. Hearing _her_ name coming from his brother's mouth had brought him back to the reality occurring around the dinner table.

" _What_?" the question sounded more hostile than he had intended and now the conversation immediately halted with his harsh tone. He could even feel the heat of Sakura silently studying him while he sharply stared at his brother. 

"Sakura is a medic," not hostile in the slightest, Itachi returned to neatly eating as if Sasuke's attitude didn't once puzzle him. It was like his brother was _actively_ _trying_ to get him upset. 

Seeing a wound and teasingly _poking_ at it to get a rise out of him. The small smile playing on the corner of Itachi's lips while not looking at him said it all. 

"Please forgive Sasuke, Sakura-san. He's usually better behaved," only half listening, he heard his mother's soft regretful words and he couldn't help feeling angered again. 

 _They're treating me like a child._ , the discovery left him feeling inexplicably cold. The situation was only worsened because _Sakura_ was witnessing it herself. 

"Its alright, Mikoto-san. I understand. Check ups can be invasive for some people," the sound of Sakura's voice had his stare turn to her again although now his expression was carefully schooled to a cold disinterested facade. 

She gave him a somewhat timid smile before adverting her eyes from him. That action alone made him wonder if he seemed _odd_ to her. 

 _She has no problems getting chummy with Itachi...,_ mentally cringing at how his thoughts had turned, his gaze returned to his food. 

"I think it's a good idea," Sasuke wasn't ever getting a _break_ tonight because even his _father_ agreed. They had medics in their clan, so why would they...?

"I'm going to my room," his words brought silence again as he finally set his, thankfully _still intact_ , chopsticks, next to his plate of untouched food. He hoped no one stopped him from leaving even as they all watched him quietly rise from his seat. 

"I'm so sorry again...," he closed his eyes briefly while leaving the dinning room, shutting out his mother's continued apologies to Sakura. 

Sasuke almost felt like an _outsider_ surrounded by strangers he couldn't trust. He felt he no longer _knew_ Sakura. As a matter of fact, he didn't know how far the loss of memories had extended outside of the compound. 

What things had been changed in their minds? Who was the hokage, since he'd seen _Kakashi_ with Sakura and Naruto that night? Were the teams still the same...?

There were so many things he no longer knew. He almost wanted to ask Sakura though he doubted she'd tell him anything. His behavior at the dinner table perhaps only made her want to stay away from him more than ever before. Being moody, _glaring_ at her, _invading_ her personal space like he'd done earlier to care for her. Everything he'd done up till that point only had put an invisible wall between them. 

He had made her _fear_ him when he was probably the _only one_ she could trust. 

 _If it weren't for this-,_ the creature in him stirred, fully aware his anger was directed towards it. The _thing_ knew the conflict it was causing and it didn't care because it wasn't in its nature to care. 

It was a miracle she hadn't punched him yet. She was probably holding herself from doing so out of respect for his mother rather than not wanting to hurt him. 

Once he was upstairs he finally felt his stiff shoulders relax with a tension he hadn't realized he'd had through dinner. Even the tightness of his belly eased to a dull ache. 

He was finally away from her and _them_. Common sense told him he should return to the dinning room to be watchful if his 'family' tried anything, but all he heard from the upstairs hallway was murmuring and some occasional soft laughter coming from them. 

Entering his dimly lit room, he couldn't help noting that there were no signs that Sakura had stayed there for weeks under a fever. His sheets had been changed and the smell of sickness and sweat were gone. A part of him almost regretted not having _something_ of hers to prove she had been there. That she had _slept_ on his bed, _used_ his pillow, left a _part_ of her presence that served as a reminder that she had _some_ contact with something of his. 

Feeling heat crawl up his neck, Sasuke scowled at the single twin bed next to the window. It was neatly made without a single wrinkle on its dark blue sheets and even his pillow had been smoothed and had no hints of an indent of Sakura once laying on it. The room was so perfectly in order that he doubted a _single_ pink strand of hair was left. 

And for some reason it all _irritated_ him. 

*****

 _I can't sleep!,_ Sakura turned on her other side on the futon in the guest bedroom, attempting to find a position to sleep in comfortably. It wasn't her back ailing her that had made her awaken for the fifth time that night, nor was it the forever watchful presence she felt when alone. 

It was how _uncomfortable_ dinner had been with the Uchiha family. Her thoughts kept returning to those events at the dinner table and how out of her own skin she'd felt sitting there with a silently glowering Sasuke that contrasted with the politeness of his family. 

He had been sitting across from her, barely speaking a word as if he was frustrated and had completely detached himself from everyone else there. Gone was the young man that had helped her hours earlier and he was replaced, like he had some unseen switch, by an icy stranger that looked at her as she was a nuisance he wanted to crush. 

Shivering under the clean quilt Mikoto had given her, Sakura stared at nothing but darkness of the new room she was given. She should have been relieved to no longer be in his bed, and the futon was surprisingly comfortable on her tired body, but she still couldn't _stay_ asleep in the suddenly new place. 

_This was were he was sleeping this whole time..._

Even though the bedding was smelling freshly clean, she couldn't help smelling something foreign, something decidedly masculine on her current bedding. In his room she hadn't noticed this scent, but in the guest bedroom, his scent seemed to invade her thoughts. 

Smoke and the smell of some soap she couldn't place. It definitely wasn't floral, but a deep fragrance that reminded her of the outdoors. Fresh leaves and faint smoke as if from standing close to a campfire...

 _Sasuke's_ scent. It wasn't cologne because she hadn't detected any on him when he'd held her close to help her after the gate incident, but a smell that was uniquely his and it appeared to be all around her just for sleeping on that futon. 

 _Kami, I'm practically_ inhaling _him in!,_ a frustrated blush appeared on her cheeks and she was happy she was alone in that silent room. It wasn't like she was _intentionally sniffing_ for him because she found the experience exciting or anything. 

Both embarrassed and annoyed by everything, she kicked off the sheets covering her and let the normal room temperature cool her suddenly overheated skin. She didn't even understand _why_ her thoughts about him went off course. He had made it painfully obvious he didn't want her around and yet she hadn't been able to stop stealing glances at him during dinner. 

 _I shouldn't even like him.,_ her face paled at her grumbling thought. Was she _liking_ him or was she only intrigued by his strange actions that were later stomped on by his apathetic demeanor? He could show extreme kindness and be like _frostbite_ the next.

It shouldn't have surprised her at all that he was in her mind due to some stirred up curiosity about him, so it possibly couldn't be _like_? 

_Why did he help me and then go out of his way to make himself unlikeable?_

His family, had been welcoming although Sakura didn't know what to make of Fugaku. He was stiffly formal yet as the tension at the dinner table eased, he showed some thoughtfulness and that he cared for his family, including the brooding Sasuke that looked like he was _forcing_ himself to be with them. 

Itachi's personality reminded her of both of his parents. He had a peaceful air about him like Mikoto, though he could show coldness similar to Fugaku like when dealing with Sasuke if necessary. She had witnessed that earlier when Sasuke had insisted on doing everything himself when her cuts had been reopened at the gates. 

The older brother seemed to have his own personality switch, though he'd been polite and friendly with her when they'd spoken alone with proper introductions and at the dinner table. 

It was _Sasuke_ who didn't put her at ease. She couldn't read him and she could tell he didn't want her to _ever_ be able to. If he hadn't been so intimidating when quietly glaring at his food, she would have said something to him, courtesy be damned. 

Yet something had kept her from doing it. There was something _threatening_ that had told her she shouldn't push anything with him whenever he grew that silent and closed off. 

Even when his eyes had been hidden from her by his longish dark bangs as he had stared at his food without moving, she had still _felt_ his stare on her. It had a heat she couldn't describe. 

_Stop thinking about him!_

Already having _enough_ thinking about him, Sakura abruptly sat up on her bedding. 

She needed to occupy her mind with something else, anything else, and her sleeping on something that smelled so much like the guy in question wasn't helping her get anywhere. 

 _I could just go to the bathroom next door. Splashing some water on my face might help me forget..._ Screw _sleeping tonight!_

Scowling, she stood up. She hadn't heard any sounds in the house so she assumed it was safe to leave the room without being spotted. 

 _I had thought the same before and then Sasuke-san startled me...,_ that one fact was what suddenly stopped her quiet walk to the sliding door of the darkened room. 

Pressing her lips into a thin line of determination, she started walking again and quietly slid the door open to an even darker dining room area. 

 _There's a bathroom upstairs. He wouldn't_ need _to come down to this one so late at night. He could just cross the hall from his-_

Her thoughts came to an immediate halt just as her body did when she saw there was a small line of light under the closed bathroom door she had reached beside the guestroom. 

She felt her whole body flush again, this time with awkward embarrassment at seeing she was wrong. Someone was quietly inside the bathroom, tending to their own necessities. 

_I should just go back to the room to wait until whoever is in there is done..._

However, willing her legs to move wasn't enough for her to leave. A _sound_ was what kept her still in shock. It shouldn't have made her feel ashamed, like she was invading someone's privacy, but the urgency in the low throaty sound had her cheeks stinging and her legs unable to walk away. Even though it was low, giving her the impression that the one that had made it was biting their lip to hold it in, the suspicious sound almost seemed to echo from the within the bathroom's walls. 

A low muffled groan followed by a gasp had her face quickly reddening to a fire hot red as her eyes widened. She wasn't stupid. Whoever was inside wasn't using the bathroom for just any _normal_ activity. The small noises they were trying to keep quiet were of a rather lascivious relief. 

 _Oh my, no! Stupid legs, move! I don't want to see who's in there!,_ hearing the flushing of a toilet and soon the running water of a faucet had Sakura becoming frantic. It was like the night in which she had been stuck on that tree as that creature had attacked her at her back. 

She was _trapped_. This was no longer her being stiff with discomfort over hearing the strangely sensual male sounds coming from the bathroom, but an invisible _force_ keeping her glued in place like some animal caught in a trap, waiting for the hunter to come take it as their prize. 

"God damn it, _move_ it!" hissing that in a loud whisper, Sakura managed to feel blood flowing back to her legs as if her anger had warned off that unknown energy. 

Stepping away from the closed bathroom door, almost tripping in her haste, Sakura had no other thought than rushing back to the guestroom and not leaving until morning, or until the _whole house_ had no one else but her inside. 

_This feels humiliating even for me when I haven't actually done anything! What if whoever it was caught me outside listening to them-?_

Something grabbed her shoulder like a vice and she didn't even have the time to scream, much less react, when her still sore back met harshly with the wall next to the door of the room she had been fleeing to. 

Startled by the quick movement, she pushed her arms up between her and the body of her assailant in the dark to put some distance, yet all she did was imprison her weakened fists between their bodies. She knew she wasn't weak and if she had her full strength she would have beaten the person to _next fucking week_ for suddenly grabbing her like a rag doll and immobilizing her with their body and the wall behind her. 

 _They're much stronger and faster._ , the feeling of helplessness had her seething. She wasn't going to put up with being held imprisoned like that.

"Get the _fuck_ off-!"

"It's you," the quiet voice was familiar and Sakura felt the tight hold on her shoulder lose some of its strength, as if those words had erased all former aggression from the person who still had their whole body pressing on hers. 

"Sasuke-san," she shouldn't had let her guard down just because it was _him_. If anything she should keep herself more alert than ever because of how quietly and abnormally fast he had caught her. She hadn't even heard the bathroom door opening in the few seconds she had turned to go to the room next door. 

"Were you listening to me?" Sakura's chest tightened as all blood drained from her face at the calmly asked question. She couldn't see him at all, but she was _certain_ his face was close enough to hers that she could feel him breathing on her now very cold skin. 

"You were, weren't you?" It sounded more like a statement than an actual question. There was no anger at all in his tone. Just coldness despite the way he still had his hand on her shoulder and his taller body holding her pinned to the wall. 

 _His hand is almost... Burning me.,_ the realization confused her. Through the cloth of the borrowed shirt she had been given to sleep, she could feel each of his long slender fingers squeezing her flesh and they were of a surprising warmth. 

"I-I didn't mean to," her reply had her mentally kicking herself. It was obvious she had no real excuse. She couldn't very well tell him that something had held her in place while he finished his... _Night activities_ on himself. 

_That's it, I just want to die. This guy must think I'm a pervert. It's all over..._

"What did you think I was doing in there?" her brows rose at him continuing the very intimate conversation. 

 _This is getting too far.,_ his quiet voice now sounded suggestive. Like he was _urging_ her to play along with him. It was a side she hadn't expected from the stoic Sasuke. 

"It doesn't matter," she prided herself on her voice being firm. "Whatever you do alone is none of my business."

_There. Now he'll back off. I don't know what kind of game he's playing with his back and forth._

But he didn't let her go and she inwardly cursed at not being able to see him. He hadn't even left the bathroom light on, leaving both of them in the dark. What could possibly be going through his mind?

"Why aren't you letting me-?"

"Be _quiet_ and _don't_ move," hearing the gritted words had Sakura instinctively obey. There was a loaded unspoken warning behind them and she didn't feel the warning or true threat was Sasuke himself. 

There was something nearly fearful lacing his order. Like he himself was feeling apprehensive. 

_I'm just imagining things and this guy is already strange enough..._

"Let go of-"

The hand on her shoulder tightened until her demand ended in a gasp of pain as she felt Sasuke's body press closer to her. She could practically feel his hips touching hers and her eyes widened in understanding when something hard nudged her lower belly. 

Now she was _definitely_ too afraid to move. Or it was the shock of feeling an obviously aroused male body nearly _grinding_ on her against the wall. The only good thing was that he wasn't making any other move and his slow pressing motions were more in rhythm with his _breathing_ , rather than an intentional movement to gratify himself. 

Sakura's heart felt like it was going to burst at this rate. She didn't know if it even was _fear_ she was feeling or something else entirely that her mind didn't want to admit to when having the moody man being too inappropriately close. 

"You shouldn't talk," he was speaking in a whisper that sounded too deceptively calm to her. It was almost like the guy wasn't at all discomforted by his physical reaction very clearly _pressing_ her lower belly so hotly she could feel it through both their clothes. 

Eventually the hold on her shoulder disappeared and the heat was gone after Sasuke's body slightly shuddered. She remained still as he had demanded, her mind thinking of his actions while her thundering heart steadied it's beat. 

_This guy couldn't control himself?_

The heat that had been emanating from his body released her and she felt an abrupt jarring coldness of loss when he finally let her go and stepped away from her. 

"Go back to your room," his voice was so soft, almost defeated in tone and she soon heard soft steps retreating unhurriedly from her. She didn't feel her body slump in the stunned disbelief of it all until his departing footsteps started stepping on the stairs to the second floor from a distance in the dark.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Still sorry (；▽；). I'm used to writing pretty dark shit and when I want to write something nice for my freaking ship, the dark loving bitch in me still pops up. 
> 
> Please leave a review or a kudos. I'll just be in a corner crying.
> 
> PS: there will be more Itachi. He'll kinda troll a bit. And Sasuke is going to go into invisible mode. After this, he'll really turn on his inner freezer with Sakura, unfortunately.


	11. Who To Trust

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Pre-massacre Itachi and Shisui are freaking trolls (who unfortunately can't be completely trusted)
> 
> Much lighthearted chapter when compared to others cos Sakura is getting to see the 'normal' facade of the rest of the clan.

Sakura felt like crap in the morning and probably looked it too. As soon as she had gotten up Mikoto only had to take one look at her to start a worried fuss about her back. 

Without sufficient chakra to completely heal herself, Sakura was nearly disgusted with herself with needing to rely on the kind woman once again. She didn't want to be dependent on her or anyone unless it was absolutely necessary so she did all she could do in the situation to calm the older woman down. 

She lied. Sakura wasn't the best at lying. To be frank she quite sucked at it and judging by the slightly skeptic look on Mikoto's face, her unskilled attempt in smiling deception failed. 

_No wonder Sasuke-san stays out of the house so much. His mother can see through anything._

Yet she didn't dislike the woman for it. Far from it. 

Mikoto wasn't pushy, yet she had a stubborn side that was as convincing as it was soft spoken until you felt you had no other choice but to give into her well-intentioned demands. While Sakura's own mother yelled things like, "Don't give me that look, Sakura Haruno! You get your ass back in that bed this instant!" Mikoto was a pro in getting her to comply to things that Sakura otherwise wouldn't have done in her impatience to explore the village freely. 

Like getting her to sit impatiently through having healing salve put on her back and redressing her wounds, as well as eating a good breakfast before setting out with Itachi to the location he had mentioned with herbs to create her own recipes of salves.

It had been downright embarrassing to leave the guest room with Mikoto walking behind her to find a slightly smiling Itachi that gave her a knowing look as he waited with an infuriating calm just outside the door. His small grin proved that he had been well aware that the reason why she had taken so long in meeting up with him had been because his mother hadn't given up on getting her needs tended to beforehand. 

It was like she was a chastised five year old. Sakura had forgotten what that was like. Once a ninja graduated from the academy they were treated as adults in some sense. Serious matters were discussed, life and death situations occurred, things _happened_ that made children's minds grow faster than their bodies. 

Despite being in her teens, Sakura felt so old. _Tired_ would probably be the best word for it. It was a mental aging that didn't show on her face, but in her eyes. She'd seen too much and had _been_ through too much. 

Mikoto's mothering for a moment reminded her of what it was like _before_ all that premature psychological aging. What it was like to be a kid again, since her own parents and her could rarely meet because of missions constantly separating them. 

As dumb as it may seem, at the age of eighteen, Sakura _missed_ her parents. Her loud mother with her tough love and quick smiles and her father that laughed so loud the whole street could hear him. They were sometimes embarrassing because they were so openly honest and loud, just like her, but she missed home. She missed her childish room, her mom's voice coming from the kitchen and her scolding her father for forgetting to do something or other, and Naruto coming to the house unannounced.

It still made her giggle how her father hadn't liked Naruto in the beginning when he'd invite himself over to their house. According to her dad, Kizashi, Naruto was "up to something" and trying to "steal" Sakura. He used to sit in the living room giving Naruto a squinty eyed glare over his newspaper as Naruto sulked back. 

In the past Sakura might have had her annoyed teenager stage with them but in moments like these she realized how much she loved her parents even though they were experts in embarrassing her with their blunt personalities. 

They weren't a prestigious clan, or powerful. Her parents weren't even high ranking ninja. In fact Sakura had been the first to go up in the ranks and she'd never forget how her father had made her blush in mortification when he had yelled with tears in his eyes over her triumphs in the middle of the crowded village streets. 

_And I'm just like them. I'm my parent's daughter after all._

These things... Made her want to _resent_ Sasuke. That guy had a good family that were obviously concerned about him and he acted coldly, pushing them away. She had seen the briefly stricken look on Mikoto's face at the dinner table the night before. The woman was good in hiding it but she was worried about him and so was his father. 

They might not be exactly as warm and as boisterous as the small Haruno family, but family was still family. 

If it hadn't been for Mikoto she would have given her youngest son a stern talk to right at the dinner table. She would have used her Haruno loud mouth to tell him things as sharply as possible, but after the events later that night she didn't know what to think of Sasuke at all or if it was wise to be alone with him. 

That was part of the reason she hadn't slept well at all. She has woken up with shadowy bags under her eyes and her face looking as pale as fresh parchment. He had chased away her sleep completely by his perverted attitude. 

 _He was... He was doing that to himself_ knowing _I was next door..._

She couldn't figure him out. If he wanted to stay away from her, shouldn't he had done that in the bathroom right across the hall from his room? Why did it have to be _that_ bathroom? The one she in which she could hear his every low groaning breath. His sounds had been so explicit, she could almost still hear him long after he was gone. 

She had tossed and turned all night because of that. She'd hear his damned perverted sounds still too clearly inside her mind and her thoughts ran wild wondering what he was thinking or what expression he had on that coldly beautiful face while breathing lustfully as she unwillingly _listened_ to him. She wasn't even certain if the heat her body had been feeling for the rest of the night was shock or something that made her as vulgar as him. 

He had been aware she was there and the pervert had been conspicuously absent from the house the following morning, _hiding_ from her delayed anger about the incident. Sakura's stomach had twisted when she saw Mikoto's face soon after opening the door of the new room given to her, and allowing the woman to talk her into caring for her wounds and feeding her as she had _Sasuke_ and everything about him, including that, going over and over in her head. 

 _These people know something's wrong with him and then he... Ugh. I can't believe he did that to me. Is_ that _his problem?_

Although she might be inexperienced in certain things, she knew enough about hormones and physical reactions. She might deny and suppress hers when she was too ashamed of it, yet she wasn't ignorant when it came to feeling the desire for something. She had never dated, nor been interested in any of the guys interested in her, but she had read books, heard Ino talk with way too much detail and had felt her heart pound for attractive actors... 

Come to think of it, she was severely _limited_ when it came to men. Sasuke was probably the only one bold enough to go that far with her. Sure Naruto might have tried to sneak a kiss with her, or had randomly hugged her too long until she had to threaten him to stop trying to feel her up by what was supposed to be a hug among _friends_ , but Sasuke had pressed his body on hers and let her _feel_ his reaction. His actions alone had awakened a morbid curiosity about him and _why_. 

His breath had been clean, evergreen in scent as if he had recently brushed his teeth, and so _warm_ upon her face. It had been a calm unhurried breathing that had her wondering if he recognized he had his _erection_ pressed against her belly during those moments. 

 _Maybe he just can't er... Control that.,_ she'd heard of some conditions as well as side effects of some jutsus before. She tried to reason with his odd actions the night before and there was multiple explanations. She shouldn't have even been surprised she was physically exhausted trying to find answers for it. 

_He could just have some kind of reaction to some other thing. Probably wasn't me at all..._

Now she felt dumb for her over thinking. If he had been interested he would have tried to go after her and yet the guy seemed to not want anything to do with her. 

 _Do I_ want _him to be interested? What the hell is-?_

"My little brother is in the training grounds on the west side of the compound," Itachi's comment had Sakura flinching because she had been too far gone in her thoughts that her mind hadn't registered being outside in the street, unknowingly giving Itachi the silent treatment. 

"Ah, well, I wasn't thinking about him!" she felt like an idiot just blurting that out loudly as Itachi stared back at her with an innocently bland expression. 

"I didn't say you were thinking about him," her mouth opened and closed like a gaping fish out of water with how Itachi seemed to have trapped her into admitting something she had been too ashamed to even acknowledge to herself. 

"Although I must say, you both are too obvious," he continued and Sakura was stunned by how unreadable his face was even though his voice was smooth, almost teasing. 

"Obvious in what...?" 

_Just play dumb..._

"I know he went downstairs around one in the morning and stayed down there longer than necessary. He left just before dawn and you woke up looking like you hadn't slept at all...," her jaw dropped and she was grateful most of the other Uchiha clan members were too busy along their way to pay them attention as they stood in the street. 

"He wasn't as quiet as he usually is getting back to his room. He must have done something to exhaust himself or at least distract him to the presence of the rest of us inside the house. Then there's him being so familiar with you yesterday when you needed help-"

"Nothing happened!"

Itachi's black eyes, eyes that were too much like Sasuke's, widened only a fraction at her angered shout. 

"I wasn't judging you. I only pointed all of this out because our mother will definitely not like to find out that Sasuke is acting that way with a guest inside our home. Just try to be more discreet in the future."

Sakura's entire face reddened. She couldn't even think of calming down the anger she was starting to feel as Itachi gave her a silent look that was more like a quiet reprimand. 

 _Is he...? Does he think I was letting Sasuke-san...? Oh my Kami! Just what do I look like to him?! I'm not the kind of girl that sleeps with a guy she barely even knows, much less a_ rude _guy that freaks me out! Sasuke-san did that to me, and it wasn't the other way around!_

About to open her mouth, increasingly getting pissed off by what Itachi was implying about her as a person, Sakura was interrupted by a cheery feminine voice of someone running up to them. 

"Itachi-kun!"

Holding her biting words in, Sakura could only grind her teeth together when a pretty girl with long dark brown hair and what she now recognized as trademark Uchiha dark eyes, reached them. 

"You must be Sakura-chan!" surprised by how friendly the girl was in comparison to Sasuke and even _Itachi_ , Sakura couldn't hide the puzzled look she shot towards the now silent older man standing next to her. 

"This is Izumi. She's known about you since you were brought here," his voice didn't show any change at all. It was like he hadn't subtly called her a _slut_ moments earlier. 

 _Itachi isn't as friendly as I thought..._ , it stung but the man's detached behavior was even colder than Sasuke's. 

Straightening her back, she forced a smile on her lips to greet Izumi who smiled warmly at her. 

She finally understood that she was truly alone in that place after all and that for her to get out, she'd have to count on her own means. 

Like scaling the tall stone walls protecting the village while no one was watching...

As that day progressed, something made itself too clear for Sakura. She should have noticed it by how Sasuke's older brother behaved. It was calculated and hard to pin down because the man himself was very good in hiding things. 

If she didn't know any better, she'd say Itachi was trying to keep her too busy to even have time to go to the walls she had eyed on their way to a nearby field for her to gather medicinal herbs. 

He was polite in a subdued way. No longer as openly friendly but still polite nonetheless, yet he was actively finding ways to keep her from being completely alone to explore a means to get out. 

Izumi, as friendly as she was, was another form of his distractions. It pained Sakura to face the fact that maybe her suspicions about the clan and the place altogether hadn't been as unfounded and fed by a normal dose of paranoia like before. 

There was nothing dangerous coming from either Itachi or Izumi, who Sakura could see clearly had feelings for the distant Uchiha. She definitely didn't feel anything wrong with Shisui who she met later on. That particular Uchiha had a similar air to Naruto although he definitely wasn't rambunctious like her teammate. It was probably his easy smile that reminded her of her friend who she still hadn't heard any news from.  

 _Nobody_ would have sensed anything wrong with the four of them amicably talking while picking herbs in a sunny surprisingly abundant field or checking with their local clansmen to find the necessary tools for her to get to work. _Nothing_ seemed out of place. 

But they were _intentionally_ stalling her. 

_Its was sunny again. Not a cloud in the sky..._

Even the weather in the evening that was rapidly approaching was of that unnerving perfection. She doubted there'd be clouds covering the stars once night completely fell too. Hours had seemed to go by as if they didn't even exist in that village.

Time was nothing. 

Now as the streets were growing darker, the rest of the clan members were putting out lamps to light up the dirt streets. Lights that she hadn't seen the night she had stood outside the gates to that very place when she had been attacked. 

"Sakura-chan! I heard that Sasuke-chan has been-"

"Izumi...," Itachi's quiet voice had a tired unspoken warning to it as the four of them walked in a group towards his house.

Confused by what the older woman had been trying to say, Sakura looked questioningly at her pretty face that was now only illuminated by the dim lighting of the street lamps. 

"Nevermind," Sakura's eyes narrowed as the girl waved a dismissive hand with a laugh.  

"Izumi-chan, I hope you don't mention that to Sasuke. He's been acting up lately and causing worry...," Shisui murmured and it only frustrated Sakura because who in the hell talks _secrets_ in front of other people?

"What about Sasuke-san?" she wasn't letting it go. She was already tired of this shit. They'd been purposely keeping her from being by herself and now they were speaking in some crappy blatant code right in front of her face. 

Itachi sighed loudly as Izumi's dark eyes lit up. 

"Itachi here told us that Sasuke has been spending time _alone_ with you," it was Shisui who answered, stealing whatever spotlight Izumi had been after with what Sakura assumed was gossip. 

Sakura's face paled as she gave Itachi an incredulous look. He only stared at her back without showing any remorse for being a-

"You're a _gossip_!" 

That's when Shisui laughed, making Sakura's glare end up directed at him. 

"Relax, no harm was done. We know nothing happened. We were just curious," holding up his hands defensively, Shisui's non-apology had her glower aimed his way intensify. She hadn't even realized they had all reached the front porch of the house. 

"We were only concerned with how Sasuke has been, Sakura," even Itachi's calm voice had a teasing edge. 

 _This whole day! Since this morning! These_ three _had been playing me to get me embarrassed about something that didn't even happen?!,_ her sharp look towards Itachi from the corner of her eyes only could see him being unreadable.

"We're so sorry, Sakura-chan! It wasn't _my_ idea," Izumi looked at her apologetically. The other girl appeared to be genuinely worried about Sakura being visibly upset so she couldn't stay angry at her. No, her anger should be _all_ for Itachi.

"Itachi made it seem like a bigger issue than what it was. By your reaction, its too obvious nothing's wrong," Shisui seemed to have mellowed down to how he was before but that didn't stop her furious thoughts. 

 _That still_ doesn't _change anything!_

"Are you four even coming in?" the coldly asked question broke the half-jovial atmosphere that had been in their group. 

Standing on the dimly lit porch was Sasuke looking at them expressionlessly. Sakura felt instantly chilled by his quick dismissive stare towards her before he walked back inside after the flatly uttered question. 

"Is he in a bad mood...?" Izumi's whisper had Sakura tensing. 

Shisui's soft almost inaudible chuckle had Sakura spinning around to lay it on him. The man seemed to be expecting it judging by how he quickly he schooled his features. 

"Let's go in," Itachi said coolly. If he hadn't said anything to stop Shisui's teasing there was no telling what she would have done. After saying that he went inside the house as Shisui cleared his throat and followed after him. 

Still trembling with some remnants of her embarrassment, she entered the house herself and set her basket of herbs down on the floor next to her to begin to take off her shoes in the entry room as she only half-listened to their talking. It was mostly Shisui and Izumi, while Itachi only spoke up if he deemed it necessary, but the group of them seemed to bring more life to the otherwise too quiet house. 

However, seeing them now, Sakura couldn't shake off the suspicion that they had distracted her from something once again. 

And Itachi... Itachi seemed to be more distant than ever before. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Gawd. I've got two versions of Itachi. Cold Itachi after the massacre and pre-massacre who is very different from the cold expressionless guy we saw in the manga. Tbh Itachi was a kind elder brother who cared deeply about Sasuke so writing him outside of what we all saw with his brother comes as a shock even to me. 
> 
> And his trolling is all for a reason. Plus Itachi is a Gemini like me and we're a sneaky bunch. We can act one way while thinking in another way. We've really got two sides of the same coin. (His attitude in this chapter will be explained in the next update and Sasuke won't be too happy about it. I might make some of y'all hate Itachi)
> 
> I also wrote Shisui as a bit of a troll himself although that'll only be for this chapter. 
> 
> Before I forget. Itachi's taken in this fic so no ItaSaku in here. Itachi is in a rather shocking relationship that will be revealed later on (but y'all can guess about it in the comments, lmao)


	12. Betrayal

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Some angst and Sasuke getting horny.

"Just what the hell was that?!" the hissed question left Sasuke's lips once he had Itachi alone in his own room.  He hadn't even bothered to knock to let himself inside once dinner was over which was a rare thing for him to do to his older sibling. 

He knew what Itachi had done and wanted to know  _why_. 

"So... You were watching all day after all. Shisui told me once we reached the field. Said you were somewhere in the woods just following us...," the words were murmured tiredly as his brother didn't turn around from the dresser he'd been in front of. Sasuke must have caught him just when he was searching for clothes to shower for the night. 

He paled though Itachi was far from accusing to him with his soft tone. His brother just sounded drained and uninterested with the conversation altogether which only helped make him angrier. 

"If you knew I was there why didn't you say anything?" realizing their parents could overhear them, Sasuke lowered his voice and closed the door to the room without turning around to look at it. His eyes refused to leave Itachi who was now giving nothing away to him. That deceptive stranger he had seen trying to get Sakura to drop her guard to get information out of her through the day was gone and all that was left was someone that only gave off the  _image_  of his brother. 

"What purpose would it have served to have you come join us? Besides that, we couldn't have gotten very far with you around," finishing those words with a sigh, Itachi finally faced him and Sasuke was puzzled with the dulled stare he was given. His brother looked defeated and more tired than he normally did. As if the day had stolen whatever energy he had left in him. 

Frowning at the sudden change, Sasuke asked quietly, "What were you after?"

"You only started behaving strangely after we found her," his eyes widened at the soft admission. 

"And you acted like that around her-?"

"You know that sometimes in missions you have to be a master of deception. She was completely closed off. The best way to see a person's true nature is when they underestimate you or are angry. They become sloppy and reveal themselves," Itachi's answer wasn't enough for him. 

_He's treating her like she's an enemy ninja suspected of infiltration. Giving her a false sense of security so she'd trust him until..._

Itachi's dulled stare sharpened on his face because the discovery must have briefly appeared on Sasuke's features. 

"Who is she to you?" he could feel his heart painfully twisting within his chest when Itachi finally cut to the matter. 

"Why does it matter who she is? She didn't give you the answers you guys wanted, did she?" Itachi stared at him in a silent observant manner that made Sasuke feel like he was put on a block to be examined. 

Sighing wearily, Itachi closed his eyes and rubbed his fingertips of one of his hands over his lowered eyelids. Although to anyone else, he'd just look like some tired man being faced with an unexpected obstacle but to Sasuke it was obvious that Itachi was ever so slightly getting exasperated with him. 

"You're not making this easy."

 _That's good because I don't want to make things easy.,_  the nasty thought had Sasuke clenching his jaw as he stared unwaveringly at his brother, waiting for him to continue. 

"Father is worried about you and so is mother. The clan has noticed a change in you and they can only see that girl as the problem," pulling his hand away Itachi gave him an unreadable look that set Sasuke's teeth on edge. 

"Sakura has nothing to do with it," Sasuke lied and from the placid expression on Itachi's face, he knew he was caught and that lying even more could bury him and Sakura deeper in whatever the clan had plotted while he had been unaware. 

"Would it please you if we stopped...?" Itachi's question surprised him. He didn't know if it was another trick or if his brother was being honest. After what he had witnessed all day, he was reminded that his brother had a natural expertise with lying. He shouldn't have thought otherwise when years earlier that same brother had trained him to hate him, forcing Sasuke's memories of his kindness to be replaced by someone who was blood drenched that had stared down at him icily as he had screamed on the floor like some dying dog.

Itachi was capable of feigning cruelty and kindness if it was for what he thought was some  _greater good_.  

 _His brother's eyes had been so cold that night. He had been nothing more than an executioner sent by the very village they had called home and that very person he had called his brother had planted the seed of hate to encourage him to kill him in a later day. To end his own suffering.._.

Sasuke nearly physically recoiled at the hatefulness that rose up in his chest as the creature seemed to shudder with both curiosity and pleasure at the old feeling reviving somewhere in the deepest recesses of his mind. The only physical reaction he allowed himself to show was his eyes narrowing and a muscle twitching on his cheek from how hard he was clenching his jaw.

The thing was  _feeding_  on that like a ravenous animal since he'd kept his distance from Sakura for the entire day. Even during dinner that night he'd done an admirable job of ignoring her with the dinner table being so crowded. 

Now since he'd deprived the creature of feasting on its hate for her, it was focusing on a hate he had long forgotten when he had  _forgiven_  his brother. 

Tightening his fist at his side, he controlled his breathing through his nose but couldn't stop himself from snapping words he couldn't hold back. He could hold himself back physically as the creature shook with excitement but the callous thoughts lodged into his throat wanted,  _needed_ , to be heard. 

"Who  _are_  you right now?" Itachi's eyes had something flicker in their black depths that went by too quickly to decipher. For a moment, Sasuke thought that his evident distrust being displayed in that question had  _wounded_  something in Itachi. 

Smoothing his expression, that tired mask Itachi seemed to have had moments earlier, returned. That's when Sasuke knew he was being shut out. 

"This is a conversation you should have with our father. As soon as he found out Sakura was going to go through the village with me, he talked to me about keeping her away from any weak spots in the area and getting her to relax her guard. It was something he thought necessary after how you behaved during dinner and I...," Sasuke's eyes narrowed on Itachi as he appeared to force himself to finish, "and I agreed."

It was  _infuriating_  how impassive his brother was when telling him this, "Didn't know you were suddenly father's puppet-!"

"He thought it was for the good of the clan. If its any consolation I didn't personally see anything wrong with the girl and told him so even though my answer didn't satisfy him," those cutting words almost had Sasuke give in to the growing festering rage. He couldn't believe what he was hearing. It wasn't the part in which Itachi had absolved Sakura of some nonexistent crimes, but the mention of the  _clan_  and the fact that Itachi had gone along with their father.

 _For the good of the_ village  _? For the good of the_ clan  _? For the good of the_ village  _? Just who do the hell are you?! He's just a monster that looks and sounds like my brother and nothing else!_

" _What the fuck is wrong with you?!_ " no longer caring about his voice rising in volume, Sasuke viciously spat out those words as Itachi quietly regarded him, unmoved from his spot. He might as well had cursed at a rock. 

Itachi parted his lips to speak but whatever words he was going to utter didn't come out. He firmly closed his mouth and stayed silent and that only seemed to make Sasuke feel small. Like some undisciplined kid. As if  _he_  were overreacting and Itachi was the only  _good_  one in the room. 

"For the good of the clan? Since when have you cared?!" taking advantage of getting no responses from the older man, Sasuke wasn't going to hold himself back from the vile creature masquerading as Itachi. "You  _never truly cared_  about the clan."

That old hatred was resurfacing, blurring the lines between the past and present. 

Taking a deep breath, Itachi lowered his head and rubbed his eyes again, "Sasuke... There's some things you'll never understand."

"Like what?!" Sasuke ignored the footsteps in the hallway. He could hear them through the closed door behind him. The only form of acknowledgment he'd give to the person standing outside was the tensing of his shoulders in case he needed to move quickly once they revealed themselves. 

"If someone in our clan is hurt, it affects all of us as whole. Don't tell me you've forgotten about that...," the lowly spoken words barely reached him but Sasuke still heard them nonetheless. He couldn't tell what his brother was thinking with his now loosened long straight dark hair covering most of his lowered face and his hand over his eyes. 

"So I'm being seen as some kind of ailing part of the clan that makes it weak?" a mirthless smirk appeared on Sasuke's lips when Itachi finally lifted his now sharp stare towards him. 

"You know that's not what I meant. I did this mostly for you than the clan itself," Sasuke knew there was more Itachi wanted to say but after the ensuing silence following those words, whatever more explanations for his actions his 'brother' had would forever remain unsaid. 

That revelation only hurt him. Whatever Itachi kept to himself would probably be even  _worse_. It  _pissed_  him off if he were to be more honest with himself but then again 'Itachi' wasn't the only liar in the room. He could conceal things just as well as his 'brother'. 

 _He's really trying to lay on his concerned brotherly act thick as if I don't know_ what _he is._

"I want you, Shisui and Izumi to stay away from her and if father comes up to you again with any brilliant ideas, tell me about it instead of messing around with her," the words were spoken through his teeth, before Sasuke turned around to put his hand on the doorknob, fully intending to leave the conversation there. He didn't think he could bear to be around his 'brother' for another second. 

"I don't know if convincing Izumi will be that easy. She wasn't as agreeable with this as you think...," Sasuke heard him but wasn't interested in talking more with him. He just wanted to be alone like he had been most of the day when watching them from a safe distance. 

Opening the door abruptly, he couldn't help stiffening at seeing his mother standing pale faced in the hallway, her hand clutched to her chest as if trying to calm herself. The awkward moment of staring into his mother's eyes had Sasuke only for a short moment,  _regret_  having lost his temper. It also made him wonder if anyone else in the house had heard him shouting. 

 _Sakura_... 

His mother must have noticed the flashing look of alarm upon his face because she said gently as if to soothe his unspoken fears, "The girls are outside. Izumi wanted to show her something there... I doubt Sakura-san heard anything."

Warmth flooded Sasuke's cheeks at how  _everyone_  seemed to be able to read him too easily for his liking. Giving a quick nod and averting his eyes, he walked past his mother to reach his room further down the hall to close the door of his darkened room quietly even though he had honestly wanted to loudly  _slam_  it to let off some frustration. 

*****

Four days. He had stayed away from Sakura for  _four days._  He didn't count dinner time as an 'encounter' since they weren't alone, but other than that time in the evening, Sasuke had avoided catching her alone in the house. 

He didn't want a repeat of the last time. That one time had been a mistake on his part. Usually he was more logical in handling things but that night, he had allowed himself to go to the downstairs bathroom on a whim. Rarely giving into something of that nature, he had mistakenly assumed his weakness wouldn't be discovered because of how late at night it had been and how he had thought Sakura's evident exhaustion would keep her glued to the futon until morning. 

He had known the  _exact_  moment Sakura had been outside that door. As much as it had disgusted him, the very thought of her being so close had  _excited_  him more than it should have. 

When pleasuring himself, his thoughts usually kept distracting him from the sensation of his hand squeezing and sliding over his swollen cock. It normally took him longer to reach an orgasm because of it, but when  _she_  had stood outside that door, he hadn't been able to stop himself from shuddering violently and letting out some of the sounds he had been suppressing. 

A perverse side of himself he hadn't known even existed had  _wanted_  her to hear. There was a lot of things he wanted that he kept silently locked away and  _that_  was one of them. 

That he wanted her to be curious. Even enjoyed the idea of her  _seeing_  him do it. An image of it being  _her_  hand pleasing him was what had gotten him the release he'd been seeking all along because  _she_  had been a couple of feet away from him with only a door separating them. 

Sasuke should have been angrier that night. He probably should have done  _more_  to frighten her away from him although the incident that happened after he had left the bathroom and caught her fleeing in the dark, should have been more than enough. 

As he had held her pinned to that wall, he had almost let  _it_  take over him. It had been too tempting to allow that vulgar carnal creature do what it wanted to her. He had been too aware of her. Her every breath, her smell, and how supple her  _flesh_  his fingertips were digging into when gripping her shoulder was. 

He'd also been too aware of how her body felt and it took a lot of restraint to not press his chest against hers to feel her quick frightened little pants with her rising and falling unrestrained breasts he'd already seen for himself. 

He had hungered to see  _more_  of her body. 

The opened doorway to the guestroom had been  _right next_  to them. It would have been too easy to take her there, muffle any of her protesting sounds and just  _take her_  to get her out of his and the creature's systems. 

The dark side in his thoughts had reasoned that she had  _loved_  him when she had remembered him. That perhaps she'd be angry at first but once she remembered she'd forgive him. The seductive excuses that made sense in his muddled mind had him shivering against her as she had stood perfectly still. 

He  _could_  have taken her and she would have  _liked_  it. 

But he didn't. Once he'd calmed himself down and those invasive thoughts were suppressed all he could feel was a mixture of shame and tiredness. Those emotions didn't turn into full fledged fear and self-disgust until he had gone back to his cold lonely room with his odorless bed. To make matters worse, he'd still had an erection when leaving her and that only added to his frustration with himself whenever  _she_  was involved. 

He was really starting to hate  _that_  part of his body. The creature was wanting to pin all the blame on her but he wasn't that far gone to allow it.  

In anger he had slapped that offensive thing between his legs that had been tenting the front his pants before turning on his stomach to pin the still hardened flesh between him and the mattress. It had been a childish action and he hadn't cared at the moment. He was willing to do anything to keep it down and stay away from her for  _both_  of their sakes. 

It had been unsurprising to him to wake up hours later just before dawn feeling disgusted with himself after he had nearly succumbed into taking Sakura by force if he had to. That disgusted feeling appeared to greet him every time he woke up and would follow him at all hours of the day. 

It was the  _least_  he deserved. 

That had been the last time he had used  _that_  method to tame the creature and it only added to his ever growing problems. If it wasn't the creature wanting to hurt Sakura, it was the 'clan'. 

After his conversation with Itachi, he stayed away from his 'brother'. The old long forgotten wounds of betrayal had been reopened and he didn't know how to mend them again when seeing another monster like the one  _he_  had, looking like his brother. 

It was painful, so painful but he had lived through it before already. He knew what all sorts of pain was like and as pathetic as it was for him to be accustomed to it, Sasuke could do what he did best because some things were impossible to erase. 

_Hide it._

He no longer knew what to think of 'Itachi' or anyone else in the compound. His 'mother' didn't look like she was hiding any ulterior motives when helping Sakura. In fact it looked like she had grown fond of her perhaps due to his own absences from the house. She probably wanted to distract her own thoughts from him by focusing more on his teammate. 

'Mikoto' didn't fuss about him as she used to, and didn't approach him with her concern. However she was aware of him leaving before the sun rose every morning because he'd find breakfast prepared for him without her in sight. Just seeing that maternal consideration had been like a knife twisting in his guts and it made Sasuke start  _doubting_  his own very understandable suspicions. 

His father was a different matter. He never truly had understood that man while he had been alive and he definitely didn't understand the 'Fugaku' present now. Despite him getting his 'brother' to reel Sakura in with a false security, he appeared to be genuinely trying to see if the gates had been tampered with. That had been what had kept Sasuke from confronting him. 

Seeing his 'father' with some clan elders inspecting the gates. It was confusing to see two different things clash. The deceptiveness of his 'family' and the caring side that appeared to be honest. 

Itachi and Shisui staying away from Sakura didn't do anything to lift the heavy veil of mistrust he refused to shake off to remain alert for any threats coming from them or the rest of the clan. 

Like Itachi had warned however, Izumi was becoming another problem with her coming over to spend time with Sakura. If it hadn't been for him overhearing what were obviously nonsensical random snippets of innocent conversation, he would have put a stop to  _her_  visits. 

He didn't know what she was going after or if her attitude towards Sakura was in any way genuine. For all he knew, Itachi could have only backed off because  _she_  was still in on it. 

Fortunately, though Sakura was friendly back with Izumi, she didn't let her guard down in the slightest. It had come as a surprise to Sasuke that while she had almost always been like an open book in their shared erased past, she was now more guarded without being too obvious doing so. She could easily fool anyone with that act and if he hadn't known the  _real_  Sakura, he would have been tricked by it too. 

When she wasn't in the house talking with Izumi or helping his mother who always refused her help to no avail, Sakura took to walking to the towering walls surrounding the compound. Sasuke watched over her with enough distance to not smell her, but just enough to see her and what she was doing. 

It was a set routine. She'd go out to the open fields used for training, would practice to give some false appearances and then would go into the woods until confronting one of the stone walls in a clearing. 

He'd stay up in the trees, feeling somewhat awkward to be watching her while she was completely unaware of him there. Her behavior while she thought she was alone was vastly different from when she was around other people. 

She'd be more relaxed, more open and had many more facial expressions while alone. He didn't know that a person could have as many varied angered expressions as Sakura did. Even when watching her from afar, it was almost entertaining to see how her features changed in varying degrees. She didn't even  _need_  to speak to say what was truly on her mind. 

_She's been climbing that wall over and over again and keeps becoming angrier._

Observing the pink haired girl land for what appeared to be the thirteenth time on the ground from climbing the wall, Sasuke could already tell that her growing confusion and frustration when scanning her surroundings meant that she didn't see an expected change of scenery each time. 

He, himself, didn't know what that meant. Unlike Sakura, he could leave the compound and that was a fact that puzzled even him. Him being able to leave but her being imprisoned by the place itself was something that he was still trying to understand. She was literally invisibly tied to the compound by the scars on her back as if the scars themselves were a leash to keep her in place. 

 _What is she noticing...?,_  seeing the girl stand up and putting her hands on her hips, her back suddenly faced him as she silently regarded the wall in front of her. 

The uchiwa fan on the back of her borrowed dark shirt made his breath lodge in his throat. He was barely getting used to the sight of it on her and it still had his thoughts pause momentarily whenever she stood still enough for him to see his family crest.

His focused stare on the symbol was interrupted when Sakura let out a string of viciously muttered words he couldn't catch as she pulled her fist back and punched the wall with enough strength that the air itself around her seemed to tremble. 

Some warm breeze carried the metallic scent of her blood as his brows rose in confusion by it. Sakura was stiff with her fist still connected to the wall and he couldn't see her face but whatever had occurred had caused that blood scent to reach him. 

She leapt back from the wall and appeared to be looking down, inspecting her hand. Even from the trees he observed her from he could see a smear of red decorating the jagged pale stone surface of the wall. 

Sakura was naturally physically strong, she would have been even more so if she had her chakra in that fist, but her blow, though powerful, hadn't been enough to make the stone crack. 

The stone had resisted and had cut through her glove until reaching her skin and by how her shoulders trembled he knew she was beyond furious. 

 _Being angry won't solve any-,_  he wasn't even shocked to see her punch the wall again. Her fists kept alternating between the left and right one and his stomach turned at how strong the smell of her blood was becoming with each of her rapid blows. 

He dug his nails into the branch he was crouching on as his nostrils flared. He could already picture how her bloodied knuckles must look under her gloves with broken skin and peeking bone. 

Swallowing dryly to keep his nausea at bay, he heard her shouting loudly and could still feel the disturbance in the once quiet atmosphere from her strength. He could hear the brute power behind every hit and he closed his eyes and breathed heavily through his mouth to not smell her. 

Sweating coldly, he trembled violently as his nails began to loudly scrape at the wood underneath his feet. He knew he needed to get away from her. If he opened his eyes, he feared he might see nothing but that blackness consuming his conscious mind again, signaling that it was no longer  _him_  in control. 

Hearing an even louder clapping sound slamming against the stone, he painfully opened his eyes to see she had given up on punching and had opted for kicking. The sound of the bottom of her sandals striking the stone was different from her punches but it at least didn't make her bleed. 

Pulling back Sakura cursed at the wall and Sasuke stared at her in disbelief when she clumsily took off one of her sandals and threw it at the offending rock as if it had the emotions to feel upset by her ire. 

"Piece of shit!" grabbing handfuls of grass with some clumps of dirt still attached she threw what little she got at the wall too before angrily bending down to take off her remaining sandal for the same treatment as its twin. 

Sasuke was witnessing a full scale tantrum. He didn't even know what he should be feeling or what he should  _do_  seeing the girl giving into what had to be the biggest angered fit he'd ever seen her have. All he could do was stare at her in mildly horrified fascination as she continued to throw anything she could. 

A small pebble she found close to her now bare feet, her medibag and she eventually resorted to throwing shuriken and kunais that were only uselessly bounced off. 

He didn't know how long she had gone in her rage. It felt like an eternity before she panted and slumped on the ground on her knees with her back still to him. 

Then her heaving pants turned to a suspicious trembling as she wrapped her arms around herself. That was enough for him to know that she had completely broken down and for some reason seeing her defenses so down before him disturbed him. 

Taking a deep breath, he closed his eyes and felt some small measure of relief in no longer sensing the creature's stirring. It was odd to him how it had hidden itself away when he'd been so close to leaping off the branch and attacking her for the fragrant blood seeping out of her broken skin. 

Not wanting to dwell on it more than he had to and still feeling the urgent need to leave just in case it decided to try to take over again, he quickly turned around and left a quietly crying Sakura behind. 

Her low sniffling fading away as he put more distance between them didn't help him forget the sound in the slightest.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Can't trust 'Itachi' (yes, Sasuke has a right to be suspicious of 'Itachi'... for now) tbh, tho I'll tell y'all right now, ALL the Uchihas in this 'clan' have their own 'inner demons' to deal with. You'll see eventually what I mean. (͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)
> 
> PS: Itachi actually gave away some plot spoilers in this but y'all have to figure them out.
> 
> And another thing... How horny do y'all think Sasuke would get seeing Sakura's ass? Just saying. (~_^)
> 
> Next chapter we might have some Naruto (he's stubborn af) and Sakura slowly regaining her chakra tho it isn't enough chakra to break down those walls. (That'll be explained later) She's already got some, she just needs to really work at it to get it to surface like before.


	13. Comfort

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Some horror (yay I went spooky for a bit. I love writing horror) for the first half of the chapter and some rare SasuSaku morning after. Sasuke is not very good in comforting people. He needs a lot of practice with that as well as handling close human contact altogether. Poor guy. (ಥ_ಥ)

Something was moving inside the house and Sakura couldn't sleep because of it. It was a shuffling sound just outside the guestroom's door that faded away for a couple of moments before returning. Every time that suspicious shuffling came, she'd hold her breath, half-expecting whoever or _whatever_ that made that sound, to slide open the thin wooden door to the room she was in. 

It was like someone was dragging their feet sluggishly. Pacing back and forth in the dining room and always pausing to do that ominous sounding shuffle outside the door as if undecided. 

The sound was repetitive as if timed. She didn't hear anything else but those dragging steps as she pulled up the quilt she was given up to her shoulders. Her eyes stared widely at the pale door that she could only see lightened because of light of the stars outside streaming inside the room through the small window behind her back. 

 _Its back again._ , she bit her lower lip and tightened her grip on the quilt. The pain of her busted knuckles squeezing the cloth as if it were some shield helped her remain alert. 

Sakura couldn't remember a time she had feared the dark. Back home, she walked in the dark of her family home to get something from the fridge late at night or to go to the bathroom. She didn't fear the dark because she always _knew_ there was nothing there. Her own house has given her security unlike other places and there was nothing to be afraid of within those familiar comforting walls while her father's snores came from her parents' room and she heard normal ambient noises like the ticking of the clock in the kitchen and the soft whirring of the refrigerator. 

This time however, there were no sounds other than that indecisive dragging on the wooden floorboards. The retreat and return was slowly driving her insane. If it had only been _noise_ that had awakened her she wouldn't have has much of a problem but the foreboding sensation that hideous low sound brought was what had her so tense. 

Whatever it was, was something _dangerous_. She wondered if she could get her bag next to the futon quietly enough to pull out a kunai to confront that thing. 

 _It sounds wet..._ , cringing, she realized the dragging had a moist quality to it. As if someone had sopping wet socks on and was lazily doing that dragging step-step routine just when they reached the door. 

She was getting annoyed with herself again. She didn't even know if this was reality or a dream but it made her feel downright childish to fear something in the dark. She might barely have some of her chakra back and she couldn't even use her seal in that condition, but _damn it_ , she had _training_ for this sort of situation. 

Both her and her team had been ambushed by stealthy assailants numerous times. People that normal ears couldn't hear because they barely made a sound when camouflaging themselves in the shadows and the leaves of trees to wait for the right moment to make a move. 

_I'm a kunoichi. What I should do shouldn't be in question!_

Vaguely still registering the eerie little stepping routine outside the door, Sakura sat up silently on the futon despite her tired body still having some soreness from hours earlier. She couldn't bring herself to regret her tantrum hours earlier at the wall because if she hadn't blown up the way she had, she wouldn't have sensed the warm comforting current of some of her chakra resurfacing.

Feeling those small bursts of power had revived her hope. Not having her chakra had made her feel defective, incomplete and weak. And _weakness_ was something she wasn't able to tolerate. She knew she wasn't some cowering girl that had no power over her enemy. 

 _All I can do with it is store it until it fully comes back. I run out too quickly because something is_ suppressing _it but it's still there._

Narrowing her eyes with determination, she easily found her bag next to the futon without the need of light. She never slept with it far away from her when camping so she didn't see the point in changing the habit now even if she was indoors in a supposedly 'safe' place. If Sasuke had a habit of keeping a _whole drawer_ full of weapons next to his bed for easy quick access, she would keep her weapons close by as well. Although she still found it odd that _he_ did that in his own home. 

 _Enough of that!_ , shutting away that train of thought, her fingers found some shuriken inside the bag and she gripped them loosely between her numbed bruised fingers, preparing to throw them at the first threat she faced.

 _Here goes nothing_., anger directed towards herself of all people was what was giving her strength during the night. She was well aware something wasn't normal with the clan or the secret village. If she had been able to get out she wouldn't have been in that predicament but until she found a way, she'd have to _fight_ whatever was after her. 

Starting by the _thing_ pacing in the dining room. 

Standing up fluidly without making a sound, Sakura was proud of having practiced stealth exhaustively on her own. Years earlier, her opponents would have heard her coming but not now. She knew how to be light on her feet and move quickly if she had to. If her chakra had been fully restored, she could have effortlessly blown half the house away along with _whatever being_ kept coming to her borrowed room's door. 

With a smirk on her lips, she carefully walked on the wooden floor, already remembering the rare spots in the floor that would creak under her weight and avoiding them until reaching the door separating her from whatever was outside.  

**_Drag, drag, step, step, drag..._ **

She stiffened briefly at how eerie it sounded now that she was standing in front of the door she needed to slide open. Hearing it closer now made her hold in her breath unconsciously as her right hand raised, poising itself to throw the shuriken once she heard it at a well enough distance. 

She was going to use her left hand to open the door. Training had taught her how to use both her hands well for throwing so even if her right arm was taken out, she could still use her left. 

 _I could just_ punch _it too, though that would deplete that small chakra reserve I've just gotten back._

The odd shuffling moved further away again. Sakura estimated it had already moved past the dining room table and was standing on the other side of it. That gave her an advantage because it put an obstacle between them. However her not knowing how _fast_ whatever it was could actually move once confronted with a threat, made her only momentarily question her strategy of a frontal attack. 

 _I can't go out the window to attack it from the back. It'd make too much noise and for all I know there could be_ more _outside expecting me to come out._

Thinning her lips, she finally slid the door open. The wood slid loudly making her mentally curse it and she was sure that it had alerted whatever was seemingly waiting for her. She could hear its sounds immediately stop and she braced herself to face it, not truly knowing what it was. 

Once her determined eyes met it across the room, all her bravery disappeared as if scared out of her. Her entire body froze and her arm to throw the shuriken stiffened painfully in position, making her remember her partially healed bruised knuckles. 

It wasn't a person. She _didn't know_ what it was. Her mind couldn't comprehend its existence. It was like a black smoky mass with dully glowing dots for eyes that stared into her own, immobilizing her body. 

 _What is that thing...?_ , her trembling gaze couldn't look away from that infernal stare. She could see the mass grow all around those eyes, in a way that reminded her of a cat with their hair raised in fear or for an attack. The blackness coming out of it appeared to eat everything around it until only _those eyes_ was what stood out and held her still. 

_Its some kind of paralysis jutsu..._

If only it were that simple. That evil stare seemed to spin noiselessly and images and sensations pierced her thoughts as her body was unable to move. She couldn't even look away from it because of its stubborn fierce hold over her. 

Panic made her sweat. She could see claws tearing into her flesh, snapping through the bones of her ribcage as she screamed without making a sound. Teeth, such horrendously sharp teeth like those of a shark pierced her still oxygen filled lungs and the flow of warm blood flowing up her throat had her uselessly and wetly gasping to spit it out. 

 _A genjutsu! A very powerful one!_ , her mind had been too terrified that she had barely noticed that it was an illusion that took over all of her senses. The strength behind it was so overwhelming she hadn't even been able to tell the difference between her mind being controlled into _feeling_ and _seeing_ that and the reality of her immobile standing body being free of those terrible wounds to her chest. 

Her arm felt numbed and willing it to move was like having a thousand needles simultaneously jabbing it. By some unknown miracle she hadn't dropped her shuriken. Her fingers gripped them tightly until they cut into her skin.

Widening her eyes with fierce anger, she forced herself to forget the pain to throw those shuriken at those red eyes. She could hear them hit wet flesh in the darkness that made its 'body' and Sakura was stunned by the putrid hot wind that blasted across her grimacing face, as if whatever it was had expelled its breath in surprise at her wounding it. 

_Its not dead. Its pissed off!_

Still not being able to flee from it, the last thing she saw was those red eyes going towards her in impossible speed as a scream of helpless rage stayed choked up in her throat. 

*****

Both of her fists twisted the cloth pressing against her cheek and Sakura could hear a thundering heartbeat against her ear as an arm wrapped around her waist to get her to stop thrashing. Her eyes were staring into nothing as she heard a muttered curse and felt the warmth of whoever was holding her, pulling her closer until she felt her romp on a very male lap. 

If she hadn't been so overwhelmed by fear she would have shouted in embarrassed outrage for having her personal space invaded by whoever was trying to hold her. But her mind still couldn't get _those hideous eyes_ to go away. She felt like she would never forget those eyes coming towards her. 

"I think she's having a panic attack," a feminine voice she couldn't quite place spoke in low urgency. Whoever the speaker was sounded so distant. 

"Father is checking the house. He saw someone leaving through the kitchen door..."

Her lips trembled but no words would come out. Even her wide eyed blind stare was suspiciously dry. She had been certain she had cried at some point but now her eyes were uncomfortably dry and stinging as if she hadn't blinked in a long time. 

"Sedatives...," the voice of the one holding her tightly to their chest rumbled gently against her ear. It was strangely comforting and she unconsciously let herself relax even though her hold wasn't letting go of what she was now certain was their shirt. 

"Get enough for the both of us..."

"Sasuke... I don't think that's a wise idea," the other male voice that she now knew was Itachi spoke closely to them as if he were crouching down in front of their trembling forms on the floor. 

"I'm staying with her," Sasuke's voice was sharp and though she sensed some hesitance from Itachi, she eventually heard him stand up to leave to do as asked. 

 _This is... This is Sasuke-san...,_ she shouldn't have gotten so comfortable but his warmth and the quick thumping of his heart against her ear had her body shuddering in relief. 

He stiffened at her strong shivering. She was literally on his lap with nothing more than some shorts and a loose t-shirt. She could feel the cloth of his pants rubbing on the underside of her bare thighs due to him having pulled her struggling body on his lap the instant he had grabbed her.

 _I'm... He has me_ sitting _on him_ _!,_ the sudden intimacy of the contact had her heart racing again. 

Too weak too move away she slowly came to recognize her surroundings. They were on the futon of the guestroom and Sasuke was holding her with his whole body tense against hers as if _enduring_ her close proximity with his one arm surrounding her waist. 

He wasn't particularly trying to console her or whispering assurances to her. She couldn't see his face because of her own face pressing on his chest like a frightened child, but she could _sense_ he couldn't bring himself to move away from her despite his discomforted stiffness. 

Sasuke obviously didn't know what to do with her. His awkwardness echoed her own and for some reason, she would have found it laughable to have the stunned stoic man just holding her as if fearing he could accidentally could _break_ her. Like he had never held someone before in his life and didn't know how to do it properly or was too afraid of attempting it. 

"I brought something for her hands. She's bleeding," the woman's voice that clearly belonged to Mikoto came closer and she could feel Sasuke's body slightly shake as he nodded to her. 

Gentle fingers lightly covered in something that strongly smelled of mint and grass skimmed over her knuckles. She still gripped unto Sasuke's shirt but surprisingly Mikoto didn't try to pry her hands off her son and had opted to put the medicine on the bruised broken flesh where she could reach. 

"The sedatives...," Itachi spoke up and she could faintly hear the tiredness he was surely feeling. It made her self-conscious. She had probably woken the entire block with a scream she couldn't remember letting out. 

 _Was that thing I saw even real?_ , that was starting to plague her. She knew she had seen something coming at her. There was still a pressure on her chest of when that inky shadow had shoved her stiff body with its eyes looking directly into hers with killing intent. 

_That was real! I can still feel it! I'm not crazy!_

Her trembling began anew and she heard someone shifting in front of them. 

"I don't think sedatives will be the correct way of doing this. She could wake up in the same panic she has now," Itachi had a point. She was surprised he'd logically come up with something she knew as a medic. There was a chance she'd wake up once again with that grip of fear rendering her speechless while there was also the possibility that she'd wake up calm. 

A sedative could probably be the _only_ way she could be calmed of the very tangible fear she was feeling. The threat might be gone, but the physical signs of distress still coursed through her body like a separate entity from her mind. Like a _symptom_ of an adrenaline giving drug.

"That's why I'm staying. I'll be here when she wakes up,"  Sasuke's declaration was greeted with a silence that was an obvious hesitance from Itachi. That brief discomforting moment only lasted for a couple of seconds. Sakura was too desperate to focus of things that were _real_ that she could have just imagined it. 

"Forgive me, Sakura...," the quiet apology confused her into painstakingly moving her unblinking dry eyes towards Itachi.

_What's... What's wrong with him?_

Itachi looked downright sickly. His eyes had a hollowed look to them and the tired lines going down his cheeks were deeper, looking like harsh precise cuts on pale clay. But that wasn't all that stunned her. It was his black irises. They were unfocused and dulled. At first she would have thought he was drugged but the more she stared at those opaque black eyes the more her heart pounded at recalling _seeing_ eyes like his before. 

They were the eyes of a corpse. As a medic she had seen that unfocused opaque stare on dead ninja in the battle field. Ninja who had died with their eyes open and had all blood flow stop circulating. The lack of blood would give their eyes that empty listless almost filmed over stare. 

Those eyes blinked at her as if puzzled by her surprise. Soon they came into focus again and the look was sharper but reassuring. In spite of her knowing they were the eyes of a dead man, something about them told her without words that Itachi was someone she could trust. 

"You'll be fine when you wake up," his murmur was what kept her from protesting when the side of her shirt was lifted and she felt something cool over the skin on the side of her waist. The pinching that followed the cool sensation of what she guessed was alcohol was the signal that she was injected by something she had allowed. 

Her breathing eased and her eyelids became heavy with the injected sedative but she was still conscious enough to hear everything around her although it was all slowly fading from her mind.

"Now me," Sasuke's voice was lower than before. He must have noticed the change in her grip and felt her body slowly going slack on him. 

"Sasuke... Are you certain you _can_ stay with her?" Sakura felt a rise of confusion within her now heavy body. There was a worried sort of accusation in Itachi's tone that she wouldn't have known came from the usually quiet man if she hadn't already seen him right in front of them. 

"... What are you talking about...?" Sasuke's question was slow in coming and the tension it brought was thick. Sakura felt she'd never understand whatever silent communication both brothers were having in that moment in a number of lifetimes. 

"I don't want you to do anything you'll regret...," sounding tired, she dimly heard Itachi stand up once again. 

She barely even heard him approach Sasuke with a new needle but she did feel Sasuke's arm releasing some of its bruising strength from around her waist.

There was a gentle swaying of her body and tentative hands seemed to guide her and Sasuke unto the futon. Her grip on his shirt had loosened but she was still connected to him through it. Whatever shame she'd feel for it was gone as a heavy grogginess she couldn't fight came over her and the now steadying heartbeat against her ear lulled her more deeply into an induced sleep.

"What troubles have you gotten yourself into now, little brother," that whisper coming from the older man she had recognized as dead was the last thing she heard faintly through the rhythmic calming thumping of Sasuke's heart. 

*****

Waking up to the bright cheerful sunlight didn't keep Sakura from gasping loudly as if she'd been under water for an eternity. The sudden wakefulness had her head rearing back abruptly from something hard that had been resting against her forehead. 

Disoriented, she blinked quickly the last of the forced heavy dreamless sleep she had been under and focused on what had been pressing on her forehead. 

Another forehead. Smooth, lightly tanned with some blue tinged black strands fallen over it boyishly.

As it dawned on her, her face blanched. She had _slept_ with Sasuke. Despite there not being anything perverted about it, the realization that she had spent the night so closely to a man had her feel a rising nervousness. 

Sasuke must have looked for a place to rest his head during the night and had used the one pillow she had. It had brought his face too close to hers until their foreheads had touched. 

Wincing, Sakura could already feel a headache coming on from that hard pressing that could have been there for hours. 

Great. Just _great_! Her first time sleeping with a guy on the same futon and pillow and the guy was a _literal stranger_ to her that had her sedated while she was in a grabby panic. The _wonders_ never ceased.

There was some odd misplaced humor somewhere deep inside her psyche about the situation but Sakura mentally stomped on it as her cheeks heated so strongly they stung. All her previous frozen fear vanished with the reality of waking up next to him. This wasn't something to laugh about. She had grabbed on to the man like holding on to him would keep her crumbling mental state together and had _slept_ with him. 

Her hands still hadn't let go off him. That fact had her eyes widening as she slowly looked down to see her yellowed and purpled hands still twisting the cloth of his grey plain shirt. The ointment Mikoto had put on her knuckles had left greasy streaks on the cloth. Grease with some tiny crushed leaves her medical training taught her were for inflammation at first glance. 

Her mind was going on hyperdrive wondering if she should _wash_ the shirt. It was the least she could do after she had stained it. She also had to apologize to Mikoto for the commotion. The woman appeared to be traditional and having Sakura pawing at her son and sleeping on the _same_ futon must have stunned her. The futon wasn't even for two people but for _one_. 

 _Please, don't wake up to see me like this!_ , her apprehensive eyes looked up at his slumbering face. He hadn't stirred yet though she couldn't celebrate because she had heard his breathing slightly change when she had awakened until it had returned back to steady breathing. 

If she didn't know any better she'd say he was _faking_ being asleep to not face the discomfort of waking up so close to her. 

Her stare narrowed on his face suspiciously. 

He appeared to be truly asleep. His body was laying on its side, facing her. There was nothing invasive since their bodies weren't pressed to each other and the only parts that they had touching had been their foreheads and her hands still tightened into fists on his shirt. 

Remembering that her hands still gripped him, she cringed when loosening her fingers. She could literally hear her bones crack as she slowly uncurled them from the cloth. Her hands weren't as sore as before but having held them in that same grabbing position for possibly hours hadn't helped her healing process at all. 

Looking back at his face to make sure he wasn't awake to see her moment of embarrassment, she couldn't stop herself from studying him. When he was awake he was usually giving her subtle glares or having a cold distant expression but now he was simply...

 _Beautiful_. 

There was an _innocence_ to his face she wouldn't have imagined the normally frosty boy to have. His face was relaxed and so open for her to look at without a sense of apprehension. His thin black eyebrows weren't lowered in a glare and he even looked younger than her with his sharp one-eyed icy gaze being covered by lowered eyelids. 

His nose was straight and perfect. She could see he got a lot of his fine features from Mikoto although the shape of his eyes were more similar to Fugaku's, except Sasuke's eyes were slightly bigger than his father's.

With his pale lips no longer pressed into a thin line, Sakura was surprised to see that even though his lips weren't neither too thin or full, they had a sensual curve to them.  

In his sleep, his long bangs had messily fallen over his forehead. This was the first time she'd seen the entirety of his face since he kept his left eye hidden under his hair that he obviously intentionally used to cover that one eye specifically. She had assumed he had some sort of deformation or a missing eye altogether from how he had never let her see that eye. 

 _Technically I'm not seeing it now either because his eyes are closed_., she mentally snorted. 

Feeling uncomfortable for gawking at him while he slept, her gaze moved elsewhere only to linger on what remained of his left arm. He used long sleeves during the day but to sleep he apparently used short sleeves. 

It was a smoothed well healed stump above the elbow. His arm wasn't completely gone like she had first thought. She idly wondered why he didn't use a prosthesis. Naruto had one himself made of Hashirama cells and it functioned just as well as his original arm. Sakura knew Sasuke wasn't of their village but perhaps...

 _How did he get a wound like that?_ , it wasn't a stare of just compassion she was giving what was left of his arm laying unmoving on his side, but also the observant eyes of a medic trying to figure out how something had happened with a lingering assessing glance.

_It looks like it was blasted off. This wasn't a cut done by a sword. I can see some scarring from a lot of pressure being put on that arm. Like a strong burst of chakra. Naruto's arm had something like that..._

Swallowing dryly she wanted to inwardly berate herself for studying Sasuke like a _patient_. Tsunade told her that it was a natural response once she learned medicine. If you saw someone hurt, your instincts would almost take over and you'd want to help whoever was ailing. 

Sasuke didn't look sick or freshly wounded to her. Yes, maybe a little tired and somewhat pale under his tan, but in need of immediate medical attention, no. 

 _Itachi on the other hand..._ , shivering, she pictured Itachi's corpse-like appearance from the night before. He had looked tired and more quiet during dinner but she couldn't believe his state had so quickly deteriorated within just hours afterwards. 

She didn't know _why_ she hadn't been afraid of him. _Anyone_ would have been scared seeing what looked like an already cooled yet moving corpse. Having seen dead men too many times for comfort, she had seen _death_ all over Itachi's face. From his hollowed eyes and cheeks, to his paper white skin and pale bloodless chapped lips. 

He had startled her, that was a fact, but when he had looked at her, she had felt calm. Those dead eyes had _life_ stirring behind them despite that opaque film making the black irises look paler than they should be. 

Itachi had been silently soothing her. The comforting words Sasuke hadn't told her to calm her while he held her were all said with Itachi's dead eyes. 

 _Did I imagine everything...?_ Both _that creature and Itachi?_

Questioning herself and her own judgement she dared to look again at Sasuke's face only to hold her breath. 

Both of his eyes were staring at her. There was no telling just how long he had been quietly awake just watching her studying his arm and the confused expressions flitting over her features as she had inwardly gone over the recent events. 

 _His left eye.._., it wasn't black like she expected it, nor missing. It was pale and had a perfect ripple pattern that didn't just completely cover his iris but the entirety of his eye including the white. She couldn't see a normal pupil, it was just a small black dot with multiple tomoe like in a design surrounding it. Before she could further study it with her quiet gaze the eye was hidden under a quickly lowered eyelid. 

 _He hides that eye and I just rudely_ stared _at it_., mentally gritting her teeth for her own awkward mess up she quickly looked at the rest of his face and even though he didn't speak, there was a light pink dusting his cheeks as he regarded her with his one visible black right eye. 

_Yeah. I offended him with my staring alright._

She couldn't even blame him for the frigid stare returning to his single eye. The sleeping innocence swiftly vanished to only leave what she now termed as _Moody Sasuke_. She regreted to see the unguarded expression he once had disappear. If she hadn't grown accustomed to his fulminating glowers snuck her way at the dinner table, she would have withered under the look he was currently giving her. 

"How long were you awake?" her question didn't even bother to conceal her suspicion. That opened eye of his was wide awake without any traces of being asleep. No groggy laziness or unfocused stare. He was _too_ alert looking at her. 

"Long enough."

 _Crap, he_ was _faking it! I knew it!,_ she felt as if her face was going to spontaneously combust. He had probably known the whole time she had been studying him. She had suspected he was only pretending to be asleep but his lack of movement and obviously relaxed appearance had given her false security. 

She was glaring back at him now. _Two_ can do the fierce staring match. She'd practiced plenty on Naruto when he'd been up to no good. Sometimes her focused stares would make him bend under pressure until he gave up whatever stupid plans he had cooked up. 

It was only a small triumph when Sasuke was the one to break their eye contact. She considered it _small_ because his quiet dismissal had a bored quality to it as he sat up on the futon. Even though their bodies hadn't been completely touching, the warmth of his once close proximity just scant inches from her leaving her side gave her a sudden chill. 

"I'll tell mother you're awake," that wasn't the same voice she had heard coming from him the night she'd held on to him. _That_ voice had some emotion, some _desperation_ he hadn't suppressed completely. 

It hadn't been flat and unfeeling like the one she was hearing now. 

Unsettled by the abrupt change in his attitude, she didn't stop him from exiting the room. As dumb as it seemed to her, despite his leaving showing no outward discomfort, she got the sense that he was running away. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh crap... Itachi is an odd one, isn't he? Wonder what that was all about (~_^). (Don't worry tho, he was truly trying to help in here. Things will become clearer in later chapters)
> 
> Lmao, I have this weird headcanon that Sasuke likes faking his sleep to kinda eyeball Sakura discreetly without her knowledge. Yeah I know its weird but I really wanted to add it into the story, plus his, what I call, the "I am busted but playing it cool" blush. Just imagine him trying his hardest to keep a straight face but with a blush on his cheeks. Its hilarious and reminds me of when team 7 first introduced themselves to Kakashi and Sakura had gushed while Sasuke's cheeks had a suspicious blush with a cool face in the manga. (Kinda salty the anime kinda didn't add that in among other things but too late to complain)
> 
> I feel so embarrassed for admitting to dorky ship headcanons.
> 
> On to other things. You've finally got an idea on just some of what the creature can do. Suppressing chakra, paralysis through fear and its a powerful genjutsu type. There's way more but I think it'd be scarier to discover it little by little instead of having me explain it all in one go. One spoiler tho, Sakura's logic wasn't off. That fear paralysis is a symptom. That thing could give you physical symptoms of fear itself to hold you still even if there is no longer something to fear or you don't see a cause. So all those times she felt apprehensive when alone... You can start guessing. 
> 
> Tomoe: is a Japanese word to describe a comma-like swirl shape. PS: he had it active in this chapter... Wonder why nothing happened, right? (͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)
> 
> PS: the official manga colorings had Sasuke as tanned, not pale as in the anime. Sorry if there was any confusion.
> 
> Please leave a kudos and/or comment if you enjoyed!
> 
> Important note: I disabled anonymous comments because an all out flame war started in one of the chapters. And also, I plan on starting to update/edit another SS fic that also hasn't been updated in forever. Readers with tumblr accounts can give suggestions for it in bitchymuggle.tumblr.com since that story is still fresh.


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